


Treat You Better

by Dreamshaper, ForxGood



Series: Treat You Better verse [1]
Category: Ghostbusters (2016)
Genre: Abusive Relationship, Angst, But we apologize for all the initial pain and suffering in advance, Domestic Violence, Erin/Phil at first, F/F, The Holtzbert endgame is real though, There will be fluff, This fic does not have a sweet start, domestic abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-01
Updated: 2017-06-22
Packaged: 2018-09-03 13:42:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 50
Words: 124,523
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8716132
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dreamshaper/pseuds/Dreamshaper, https://archiveofourown.org/users/ForxGood/pseuds/ForxGood
Summary: Shortly after the Ghostbusters saved New York, Erin gets back together with Phil, and even though it breaks her heart, Holtzmann gives her best to be happy for her. However, it doesn't take long for the engineer to realize that something about this relationship is horribly wrong...





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So I was watching the extended edition of Ghostbusters and posted about what a jerk Phil is. ForxGood (scientificxmethod on tumblr) and I got talking, and this fic happened. It's a joint effort, where I wrote angst, and ForxGood took a look at it and decided 'I can make this angstier'. Credit for the amazing title goes to Ectoholtzmann :)

When the day everything changed started, nobody had the slightest idea that anything out of the ordinary was going to happen.

Of course,  _ out of the ordinary  _ was quite a loose definition for the Ghostbusters, simply because of their line of work. For them, ordinary was hunting and trapping ghosts, studying them, little to medium (and sometimes even big) poofs coming from the upstairs lab where Holtzmann did her work, usually followed by the engineer calling down “I’m okay!”, sometimes followed by the hiss of a fire extinguisher – which usually led to one of them going up and checking that only material was burning, and not Holtzmann herself – and going to the bar or having takeout together after another successful bust.

Ordinary was, for Erin, coming back from a bust covered in slime – the stuff  _ was  _ after her personally, she was so sure of that by now. Ordinary was sending reports about those busts to the mayor’s office (by now, she didn’t even mention anymore when she got covered in slime, figuring that the mayor had noticed the trend after it had been part of every single report for a month or so). Ordinary was trying to teach Kevin how to handle the phone and e-mail when they were not out busting ghosts, or testing new equipment Holtzmann had whipped up in her lab.

Ordinary was also to pay a lot more attention to what the engineer was doing than it probably was suitable for a friend. She couldn’t help herself though; fascinated by the work the blonde did, the gadgets she came up with, and how she made them function so perfectly (most of the time). It was also somewhat ordinary to have them do things she’d never intended, but at least she never let them test anything when she wasn’t completely sure it wouldn’t harm them.

And ordinary was for her to blush at the things Holtzmann said to her, at the flirty remarks and the pet names (“hot stuff” being a favourite, closely followed by various sweets, usually “cupcake” or “muffin”). She was blushing with such regularity, in fact, that she wondered if it could turn into some sort of health hazard.

What wasn’t ordinary - was in fact far from ordinary - was Phil showing up that certain day out of the blue and standing there somewhat awkwardly, fiddling with his tie as Erin’s three science friends, as she had called them – he hadn’t bothered to learn their names, even though they all were somewhat famous now – were staring at him.

“You want to what”, Erin said, distracting him from the way her friends were looking at him, sounding a bit confused, as if he hadn’t spoken quite clearly. He cleared his throat, unnerved especially by the blonde’s – Holdsmar? Holdsmack? Something – stare, forcing himself to focus on Erin as he repeated himself.

“I want to take you out”, Phil said, smiling at the physicist, “on a date. Things ended so badly between us, and, to be honest, you kinda walked out on me at the last talk we had. So I figure, you at least owe me one dinner to talk about all of it?”

Holtzmann raised an eyebrow at that. Owe him? She doubted Erin owed that man anything. But Erin stood with her back to her, and didn’t see the blonde’s reaction. And thanks to that, the engineer, in turn, missed the doubtful look on her face, the redhead’s mind racing a mile a minute as she tried to come up with an answer to his question.

She didn’t feel much like going out with him. Their initial relationship had been awkward at best, after all, but she figured that he was right. Their last talk hadn’t ended on civil terms, what with her walking away to join her friends on a bust. She had just left him there. Which, in hindsight, Erin supposed was awfully rude of her.

(As she thought this, she was unaware of how she acted just like he had expected her to. Phil knew her well and he knew what to say to push the right buttons).

And so, to the surprise of everyone else in the room, she found herself nodding, and even smiled a bit at the way his face lit up at the agreement.

“Great”, he said, “I’ll pick you up at eight. Wear something elegant.”

“Um, yeah, at eight”, Erin agreed, and now Holtzmann was glad that the redhead still had her back to her, because she was unable to hold back the shock and even pain from showing on her face there. It only showed for a few moments, though, the engineer quickly getting her features under control again. By the time Phil had taken his leave and Erin was returning to them, her face looked perfectly natural again. Holtz was grateful for the years of crushing on straight girls that had taught her this trick.

“Wow”, Abby commented the moment he was out the door. “That was unexpected. And not just him showing up. You sure this is a good idea?”

“It’s just one dinner”, Erin replied with a shrug, “and he was kinda right, our last talk did end on a sour note. After all the time we were together, he deserves better.”

_ He doesn’t _ , Holtzmann thought to herself. None of this showing through her features though, not this time.  _ He deserved even less than that for how he spoke to you. He doesn’t deserve you. _

“I still think he’s a sexy dancer”, Patty recalled their previous talk about the man, making Abby roll her eyes while Erin looked mostly confused, “Erin, if you hook up with him again, take him dancing with us some time so Abby can see that he’s good at it.”

“Oh, he doesn’t dance.” Erin replied casually. “He thinks it’s a waste of time.” And that didn’t surprise Holtzmann at all. Of course that guy didn’t dance, and of course he would think it was a waste of time. Erin loved to dance though, she knew that much. She supposed the physicist must really like him if she was willing to cut down on her dancing time, not even making a big deal out of it.

It appeared Erin was done talking about the subject of Phil, though, and turned her attention back to Holtzmann again. “Okay so, where were we?”

“Proton machine gun”, Holtzmann replied, managing to sound cheerful and like her usual self; as if the fact that Erin had agreed to go out with this guy again hadn’t broken her heart in roughly a million pieces. “It’s almost ready for the test phase. It’s gonna kick some serious ghost butt.”

Erin looked quite excited at that and nodded, and somehow, Holtzmann managed to smile back. The rest of the evening, until Erin had to leave to get ready for her date, the engineer kept up the façade, only allowing her dismay to show on her face when she was back up in her lab, frowning at her project as she worked.

She didn’t know Phil much, so she told herself that it wasn’t fair to judge him when she had so little information. She told herself that the important thing was that Erin was happy, and if Erin was happy, Holtzmann could try to be happy  _ for _ her.

Still, she found herself unable to shake the feeling that this was a bad idea, that Erin never should have said yes to that date.

… And she didn’t have the slightest idea how right she was.


	2. Chapter 2

Holtzmann tried to not let it hurt her when Erin came into the fire station the next morning looking quite happy and at peace with herself. She told herself that she should be happy for her friend. Because that was all Erin was; a friend. And clearly, she’d had a good time, judging from the spring in her step and the way she cheerily wished them all a good morning.

“Someone’s in a good mood”, Abby observed while Holtzmann forced a smile onto her face, not wanting the physicist to notice that she felt like smashing something, “had a good date?”

“Oh yes, it was very nice”, Erin told her as she moved to pour herself a cup of coffee, eyes lighting up when she spotted the box of donuts Abby had brought in. “We went to this new restaurant; you know, the one close to Times Square? Phil ordered a very good white wine and their mixed fish platter, it was delicious.”

“Did he now”, Holtzmann mumbled under her breath, shaking her head when Erin looked at her and asked if she had said something. Momentarily, the physicist looked confused and doubtful, then apparently shrugged it off, helping herself to one of the donuts before she sat down at the table to have breakfast.

“So there’s gonna be another date then?” Patty wanted to know, joining them at the breakfast table, “Or was it a one-time thing anyway?”

“Dinner again this Saturday”, Erin answered with a smile, missing how Holtzmann’s fingers tightened around her coffee cup. “It went really well, and he asked for another chance, so…”

“Huh”, Abby let out, giving her a doubtful look. “Are you sure this is a good idea? I mean, from what you told me, he wasn’t exactly… the most supportive boyfriend.”

“We talked about that during dinner last night.” Erin assured her. “He knows what he did was wrong, but we both made mistakes during the relationship. But now we know what went wrong, and we both want to fix it. He seemed really sincere when he asked for another chance, and I felt wrong saying no right away. If it doesn’t work out, I can still break it off again later.”

“Huh”, Abby repeated, still not sounding too convinced. “Well, I guess… I mean, you’re old enough to know what you’re doing, and if you think it’s the right thing… Fingers crossed it’ll work out.”

“Thank you”, Erin smiled, “I think it will. He said he missed me quite a bit since we broke up, so…”

_ She didn’t say that she had missed him, too _ , Holtzmann noticed, but she didn’t dare to ask about it, afraid of what the answer might be. Instead, she just downed the rest of her coffee in one go, then mumbled about having work to do. As she got up from her seat, she didn’t miss the concerned look Patty shot her, while Erin remained completely oblivious to the emotional state of the engineer.

“Well, it’d be weird if he asked you out again when he didn’t miss you”, Abby pointed out, while Holtzmann thumped up the stairs, perhaps stepping on them with a bit more force than necessary, “but, as long as you’re happy…?”

“Let’s just see how it works out”, Erin replied with a small smile, only to flinch when a medium poof could be heard from the second floor. It was quite early in the day for that, Erin supposed, but at least Holtzmann called out an “all good!” a second later. Plus, there was no fire extinguisher hissing afterwards, so the physicist figured it couldn’t be too bad.

That didn’t stop her from calling out a “Take care up there, Holtz”, anyway, just to make sure the engineer was – and remained – okay. A vaguely agreeing noise came as an answer, and she shook her head to herself as she took a bite of the donut, looking even more delighted when she discovered it was the kind she liked best: the one with raspberry filling.

“I’ve never seen someone so happy about a jam-filled donut”, Patty commented, smirking. Erin just shrugged and took another big bite. It wasn’t just the donut, of course. Erin was currently very thrilled about the way her life was working out for her. She was a Ghostbuster, she got paid to work with her best friends on the topic of ghosts – something she had been dreaming about since she was a little girl – and to top it all off, she just had a  _ very _ nice date the night before.

Of course, the donut also wasn’t a bad addition, and neither was the coffee she washed it down with, before asking what the plan for the day was.

“Oh, the usual”, Abby told her, “Holtzmann makes things go boom up there, and we do our thing, unless we are called on a bust. Or unless Holtzmann makes a giant poof instead of a medium one and blows up the building.”

“No jokes about that, please”, Erin grimaced, before finishing the donut and her coffee. Afterwards, she moved to her desk and got to work, the others doing the same, the topic of Phil and that fact that Erin was dating him again for the moment forgotten.

A few hours later, Kevin distracted her from her work, looking as confused as he always did when he had a message to deliver. “Hey, Boss Erin, phone for you.” Erin looked at him with a frown, turning away from the whiteboard she was working at. “Some guy named Hill?”

“Phil”, Erin corrected, wondering why he would call her at her work. Didn’t he have her cell number?

Then she remembered she generally forgot to check her own phone whenever she got too lost in her work. She couldn’t help it; the world of the physics of the paranormal was endlessly exciting to her, and she generally forgot to check her phone for hours on end if she was trying to figure out another equation. In a way, she supposed it was sweet he went through the extra effort to talk to her, so she put the marker down and made her way over to the phone with a smile, thanking Kevin before she took the receiver from him. “Hi Phil.”

“Erin, it’s me”, Phil greeted her. “I kinda need to reschedule our date. You’re free tomorrow evening, right? There’s a little get together at Professor Bronstein’s house, I’m invited, and I can bring a plus one. Want to be my plus one?”

“Yes, of course”, Erin replied, very much liking the idea of going to such an event with him. The Ghostbusters were somewhat famous and respected now, but invitations to gatherings of academics were rare, and she jumped at the chance to visit one.

Belatedly, she remembered that there had been plans for a movie night for the next evening, but she didn’t mention that to Phil.  _ It was just movie night,  _ she told herself.  _ Certainly, the girls would understand. It wasn’t like they couldn’t watch movies without her. _

“I’ll pick you up at seven”, he said, distracting her from these thoughts. “And, oh, that dress you wore to our date was nice, but maybe something a tad more elegant this time? Thanks.”

Erin was a bit put off by the comment he had made about her dress, but made some vaguely agreeing noise to his words. He told her he was looking forward to it, then wished her a nice day “at your ghostbusting business” before ending the call. Erin hung up the receiver as well before she went to tell the others that she couldn’t be part of movie night after all.

“Wow, that guy wants to spend a lot of time with you”, Patty observed, “guess that is a good sign, huh?”

Erin nodded in response, an excited smile on her face. Patty was right, the fact that Phil wanted to spend this much time with her  _ was _ a good sign. Part of her wondered why she hadn’t given him another chance sooner. He clearly liked her, and he was sorry about the way he had treated her before… Why had it taken her so long to see that?

Holtzmann, however, didn’t look happy at all about the thought of having movie night without Erin. Not that she said anything about it, of course, because even Abby - who still didn’t seem to be the biggest fan of Phil - just told her to have fun. “But stay away from the shrimp cocktails.” She warned her. “The last thing we need is you getting an upset stomach from questionable shrimp.”

“I’ll stay away from the shrimp, I promise.”, Erin replied with a roll of her eyes, before looking at her friends with a more apologetic expression. “But you guys are not mad then? You I wouldn’t cancel if that wasn’t kind of an important thing…”

“Nah, that’s okay”, Patty reassured her, smiling brightly, “new boyfriend wants to spend time with you, of course we’re not mad!”

“Not quite a  _ new _ boyfriend though”, Holtzmann pointed out, shrugging at the look the historian shot her. “What? It’s true. She’s dated him before.”

“I did”, Erin confirmed. “And I’m not sure he’s my boyfriend again? Yet? I mean, we said we’d give it another try but…”

“Just let things run their course”, Patty advised, elbowing Holtzmann at the frown which appeared on her face. “See how it goes! Honestly honey, I hope it turns out well, you deserve it after all the crap you been through.”

“Thank you”, Erin smiled, touched; Patty beamed back at her, and Abby managed a smile, too, but the physicist took note of how the only one who didn’t share their grinning was Holtzmann, the blonde still looking somewhat grumpy.

“It’s my favourite movie”, She mumbled at the questioning look Erin gave her, which made the redhead’s heart sink a little. She did feel a little bad now, knowing how important Holtzmann thought their time together as a family was. Sharing her favourite movie with all of them must have been a big deal for her, and Erin completely understood why Holtzmann would feel sad about Erin cancelling. So she cleared her throat, then offered to watch it with her another time, regretting that specific choice of words almost immediately when Holtzmann smirked at her. “Just you and me, hot stuff?”

Erin blushed at that, rolling her eyes in mock-annoyance at Holtzmann’s sparkling eyes. Calling her “hot stuff” was a guaranteed way to make her blush, and she knew Holtzmann enjoyed the sight of that just a little too much. It had worked to make the blonde feel better, though, so Erin couldn’t bring herself to mind it all that much – another thing she was pretty sure Holtzmann knew.

“I imagine Patty and Abby will want to join, too”, Erin told her, her cheeks still quite a healthy shade of red, “but if they don’t, yeah, just you and me.”

“Excellent”, Holtzmann smirked, causing Erin’s blush to intensify.

The physicist smiled back at her before excusing herself, telling them she had more work to do. She was feeling ridiculously happy and content as she made her way back to her desk, very much looking forward to the second date with Phil. Their initial relationship may have crashed and burned, but she was completely convinced that this time, the relationship would work out just fine.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys! ForxGood here. Just to let you know, Dreamshaper and I are still only gonna be updating this on Thursdays until we've finished writing the entire thing (we're about midway through I'd say, it's a trip, and we still have a lot of big ideas) but I had coffee with a LOVELY fellow Ghostbusters fan yesterday who was kind enough to inform me that this fic is already making quite the name for itself in the fandom. So here's a little bonus update for y'all as a sort of thank you for that. Happy Holidays :)

For the next two weeks, the relationship _did_ work out just fine, and Erin was almost annoyingly happy whenever she was around the fire station. Abby and Patty were genuinely happy for her, asking her about the dates Phil took her on, and listening with great attention to detail when she told them about it.

Holtzmann, on the other hand, asked much less questions, and tried to not hear too much of what Erin was saying about her times with the man.

She tried to be happy for Erin. Honestly. She tried hard, really hard, but it just wouldn’t work. All she felt when Erin told them that Phil had ordered the most exquisite fish dinner or this really good salad for lunch was jealousy and bitterness, and she hated herself for feeling this way. She never had wanted to be that kind of friend, the kind that couldn’t even be happy for her because of her own stupid crush. But apparently, she was unable to help herself when it came to Erin and Phil.

The first time Erin came to work with a clearly visible hickey on her neck, Holtzmann nearly broke her coffee mug from gripping it so tight.

Erin didn’t notice, but Patty did, and she gave her friend a warning look. She said nothing about the hickey to Erin, but Abby wasn’t so discreet, her teasing making the physicist blush brightly, even though her smile told them all that she wasn’t as mortified as she might have tried to appear.

“A Lady doesn’t kiss and tell”, Erin told Abby as she moved to get herself a coffee as well, and Holtzmann noted how she briefly glanced at the box of donuts – she’d gotten it this time, and she’d made sure to have two of the ones Erin liked best in it. Erin didn’t take one; apparently, a coffee was enough for her this morning.

Even though Holtzmann knew it was probably childish and somewhat stupid, she found herself feeling oddly rejected when Erin sat down next to her with no donut.

 _Don’t be silly_ , she told herself. She was glumly staring at her coffee, as if it could tell her the answers to her predicament if she just looked at it long enough. _It’s not like she dumped you for him or something. You’re friends, no more than that, so act like one and at least pretend to be happy for her._

“Well, I’m glad you had a good time”, she thus said out loud, and Erin looked a bit surprised; apparently, Holtzmann hadn’t been very adept at hiding her dismay about this relationship. But then the physicist smiled, and reached out to briefly touch Holtzmann’s hand, unaware of the jolt she sent up the blonde’s arm with the short, innocent contact.

“Thank you”, the redhead said, her smile widening a bit. She had worried about Holtzmann’s reaction to her new relationship for a while now, worried the blonde would think Erin was going to leave them just because she was dating someone now. So the engineer telling her she was happy for her, in any way she could get it, was a massive relief to Erin.

Holtzmann forced herself to smile back at her – noting it took a lot less effort than usual, what with Erin looking at her like that - and then excused herself. “More work”, she told them. Lucky for her, there was always work she could do upstairs, so it wasn’t even a lie. Not really.

She made her way up to the lab and only once she was alone up there did she let her frustration show. She wanted to throw or destroy something as she thought back to the mark on Erin’s neck, a mark which immediately led to other thoughts, images of Phil kissing and touching the physicist, images of her moaning at his touch.

 _It should have been me_ , Holtzmann thought to herself, clenching her fists in helpless frustration. _Dammit, it should have been_ me _. But I waited too long, didn’t show her enough how much I want her,_ need _her and now it’s him when it should be me._

She sat down at her workbench and stared at her current project – an updated version of the proton shotgun, which would do more damage with less kickback. Updates she was making specifically for _Erin_.

Of course. As if the universe hadn’t been mocking her enough already.

Still, she forced herself to pick up the screwdriver and start working. She heard the others talking and laughing downstairs, and once more she told herself that she should be happy for Erin, or at least should try to be happy for her. But no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t quite get there.

Days passed, and Holtzmann tried her best to not let it show how much it bothered her that Erin and Phil were (now officially, too) back together. Erin called the man her boyfriend again – something which always resulted in Holtzmann feeling like something had just stabbed her in the heart – and he probably introduced her as his girlfriend whenever they went somewhere together.

The mere thought of that made Holtzmann’s stomach turn.

It seemed that Phil was quite eager to see the physicist, too, taking her out on dates at least twice a week. _Apparently_ , Holtzmann thought whenever a dreamy Erin told them about those dates afterwards, _the man was really big on fish and salad._ It was all they ever seemed to eat when they went out. Or at least it was all he ever ordered for them.

(Much, much later, Holtzmann would lie awake at night and ask herself how she hadn’t picked up on this earlier, how she hadn’t noticed the signs sooner).

At least Erin hadn’t cancelled any more activities with them for a date with the guy (Holtzmann usually referred to him as The Guy in her mind, as if his name was something she didn’t want in her brain). So far, the physicist was managing to balance her time between her dates with him and her time spent hanging out with the other three Ghostbusters quite well.

Another point in his favour was that he didn’t show his face often at their HQ, apparently preferring to pick Erin up from her apartment or have her meet him somewhere. So far, he had only showed up once, three weeks after their first date, to pick Erin up for a lunch date.

It had bothered Holtzmann more than it probably should have.

“Holtzy, baby, I love you”, Patty told her the moment Erin and Phil were out the door, “but you have to stop looking so grumpy each time Erin mentions her guy. I know this is hard for you but…”

“But it’s my own fault, isn’t it”, Holtzmann finished somewhat bitterly, Patty looking taken aback at her words and tone. “I waited too long, I didn’t make it clear enough that I really like her and am not joking, and now someone else snatched her up.”

“Oh honey”, Patty replied, moving to put a comforting hand on her shoulder. After all, she’d been the one Holtzmann had come to when she’d been too overwhelmed by her crush on Erin to handle it on her own. And even though the engineer kept calling it a crush, Patty knew it was more than that, knew that Holtzmann was honest-to-God in love with Erin, possibly more than she herself was aware of.

“I’m an idiot”, Holtzmann mumbled, staring at the door through which Erin and Phil had left. Not quite sure what to say to that, Patty just shook her head and rubbed the blonde’s back, wishing for the magic words which would make this better, but knowing that those didn’t exist. All she could do was to be there for Holtzmann the best she could, until the engineer could handle all of this on her own.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello guys, Dreamshaper here :) So, um, the lovely tags up there about abusive relationship and domestic violence? They're becoming relevant for the end part of this chapter, so please proceed with care.

It took another two weeks until Holtzmann realized that something strange was going on.

She hadn’t thought much of it the first few times Erin had skipped donuts for breakfast, knowing that not everyone had the questionable ability she possessed to eat insane amounts of food early in the morning. However, she did pick up on it when Erin began declining snacks in the afternoon as well, and when her choices for lunch slowly began to change.

Abby and Patty seemed to either not notice or think nothing of it, but Holtzmann did, and she started to pay special attention to it once she had realized that something odd was going on with her friend.

Lunch was a noticeable change, Holtzmann realized, and she wondered silently how Abby and Patty could not notice that. Where before Erin had eaten pizza and Chinese and tacos with them, she now mostly ate fish or salad, giving Holtzmann cause to wonder if Phil’s apparent love for fish had rubbed off on her.

She also wondered if she should bring this up with the other two, but eventually decided against it. After all, how obsessive would it seem to her friends that she paid such close attention to what Erin ate and didn’t eat? They would think she was some sort of creep, like a stalker who didn’t actually need to stalk their victim because they worked together.

So she kept it to herself, even though she made sure to memorize every little thing she thought was off about Erin. She mentally noted down each time Erin declined a snack, especially when she did so with the words “Oh no thanks, I had a big lunch” when Holtzmann knew that she hadn’t. More often than not, the engineer had in fact been sitting right next to her at lunch, where she’d eaten little more than a sandwich, or a salad, or something equally light.

Holtzmann asked herself if she should write these things down – just in case – but that seemed oddly obsessive. She wondered if perhaps she was overreacting. Certainly she had to be. Erin wasn’t the only woman on the planet who watched her food intake and tried to eat healthy. Just because Holtzmann didn’t care much what she filled her stomach with, it didn’t mean that everyone else thought the same.

_ Perhaps _ , she told herself,  _ Erin’s new diet was just part of her Ghostbusters regime, and only coincidentally coincided with her getting back together with Phil _ . After all, ghostbusting was a physically taxing job, and it’d only make sense for Erin to want to stay fit for it. More likely than not, Erin’s new eating habits were  _ completely _ unrelated to her new relationship, and Holtzmann was just overreacting again.

She told herself all these things to drown out the soft alarm bells which rang at the far back of her mind each time Erin declined a snack, or had salad while the rest of them were munching down pizza or tacos.

And it worked. For a while, at least.

It worked until Holtzmann picked up on other changes, unrelated to food. Perhaps she was paying more attention on Erin than it was strictly appropriate for a friend, but she couldn’t really help herself. And so, when they were called on a bust, Holtzmann noticed that apparently, Erin had been walking around wearing the high heels she had worn the day they had met, instead of the comfortable sneakers she’d been wearing the past few months.

She frowned, thinking back to the time at Aldridge Mansion, when she had asked her how it was to walk around in these shoes all day. She remembered Erin had said it wasn’t fun; had it on tape, even. And still, she was taking off just these shoes now to put on her busting boots.

Holtzmann could have sworn she saw her grimace, too, when she pulled them off.

She filed that away along with the new eating habits of her friend, but didn’t comment on it. They had a ghost to bust, after all; this was not the time to make remarks about Erin’s choice of footwear. Besides, she had taken the things off now anyway. Holtzmann noted she looked quite a bit more comfortable when she stood up in the rubber boots she wore when going out to bust ghosts –  ridiculous teal-coloured things with a flower print Holtzmann found adorable beyond words.

The bust itself wasn’t all too difficult; a somewhat harmless Class III apparition. Erin still ended up slimed though, something she was resigned to by now – the stuff did target her personally, and she only sighed once the ghost had been sucked into the trap, holding still so Holtzmann could wipe the slime out of her eyes.

“Thanks”, She grumbled with a sigh as the blonde wiped her hands on her own jumpsuit. “Just this once, I would have liked it especially to not get slimed. I told Phil I’d meet him at his home after the bust.”

“He gets to see you in all your slime-covered glory then”, Abby joked, giggling. “See it like that, it’s a good thing if he gets used to it, seeing how often it happens to you!”

Erin replied with a roll of her eyes and a smile, then gave Holtzmann another thankful look as the blonde was busy trying to get the slime out of her hair. Erin told her to give up on it, that only a shower would help with that, and just asked her to drop her off at Phil’s if she really wanted to help.

The engineer hid the flash of dismay at this request quite well, just nodding at Erin in agreement, and walking her to the car, making sure to help Erin with storing away her proton pack. The things were still ridiculously heavy, and the less slime Erin would have to deal with, the better.

At least it wasn’t far to the man’s home, and Erin waved goodbye to them from the sidewalk before she went into the apartment building. Her boots made squelching noises as she walked up the stairs to Phil’s apartment –  not wanting to mess up the elevator – with traces of slime remaining on the wood after she’d knocked the door.

“Erin”, he said, smiling as he opened the door, which had Erin look a bit sheepish. After all, this was the first time he would see her in, as Abby had dubbed it, ‘all her slime-covered glory’. It was why she hadn’t even been a little surprised to see his smile fade when he got a better look at her. Ectoplasm had never been a good look for her, after all, and she reasoned it was only natural for him to furrow his brow and frown he took in the slime clinging to her coveralls and hair.

What she hadn’t expected, however, was for that confused and surprised look to turn into one of complete and utter contempt.

“What the Hell”, he said, sounding so put-out that Erin nearly took a step back. “That is  _ disgusting _ ! You’re not coming in here like that. Take that off.”

“What, here?” Erin protested, completely taken aback at the tone of his voice, his words hitting her harder than she had expected them to. “What if someone walks past and sees me?”

“No one around right now, so better hurry”, Phil replied, crossing his arms over his chest. He noticed the slime on his door and grimaced again, before going back to glaring at Erin.

The redhead stared at him for a few seconds, convinced that he must be joking. But when he didn’t budge, Erin swallowed thickly, her gaze dropping to the floor as she pulled off her boots. She then quickly pulled off her coveralls, Phil making a noise of disgust when they hit the floor with a squelching sound, before covering herself with her arms best she could. She had stopped wearing anything other than her underwear under her coveralls a while ago, after learning that those too would get ruined whenever she got slimed. The stuff literally ended up in  _ every _ crack, and after having half her clothes end up in the laundry nearly twice a week, Erin had just given up on it.

She was now severely regretting that decision, standing in Phil’s hallway, feeling more exposed than in that fever dream she had once where she was naked in a Spanish exam. It probably had something to do with the fact that he was looking at her like she was the most unappealing thing he’d ever seen.

“Leave that there for now”, he told her with a nod to the coveralls and boots, before grabbing her – luckily clean – arm and pulling her inside before anyone could see her. “You can get rid of those later. Jesus,  _ the smell _ , how can you stand walking around like that?! It’s disgusting.” He grumbled, quickly letting go of Erin’s arm as he slammed the door shut behind her. “Now get in the shower before I puke.”

As he said the last few words, he pushed her in the back, towards the bathroom. The push itself wasn’t too hard, but it was certainly unexpected, causing Erin to flinch as she stumbled towards the bathroom. She suddenly felt close to tears, and quickly pulled the door shut behind her, making sure not to rest against it in fear of covering it in more slime.

She hadn’t been sure what she had been expecting from Phil, but it certainly hadn’t been  _ this _ , this absolute disgust and contempt. Sure, Erin knew ectoplasm was disgusting, but it (unfortunately) was a big part of her life. She had told Phil as much before, about how the slimy green goo seemed to have it in for her. At the time he had just laughed, telling her it probably wasn’t that bad, and that she probably made it look cute.

She wondered now if she should have warned him more, and felt bad for clearly having shocked him with this.

Quickly pulling off her underwear and getting into the tub, wincing as she still saw traces of slime on the bathroom tiles, she pulled the curtain closed and turned on the water. The spray was cold at first,  _ much _ too cold, but Erin vigorously scrubbed away at the slime anyway, not wanting to spend a second more covered in the green goo than entirely necessary. Soon, Erin’s skin was red raw from scrubbing, the water temperature as high as she could physically stand it. Still, when the tears came, it wasn’t because of any physical pain. Her skin hurt, yes, but it was nothing compared to the aching feeling she felt inside every time she pictured the look on her boyfriend’s face when he had seen her.  

She stayed in the shower for a while. Not just to make sure she had scrubbed every last part of her completely clean of ectoplasm – and then scrubbed again and again just to check – but also to allow herself some time to compose herself. Phil’s words had hurt her more than she thought they would, but she didn’t want him to see her cry. So as the slime washed down the drain, so did a few tears, the salty substance falling silently as Erin cleaned herself up.

When she got out of the shower, wrapping the towel around herself she opened the door to find Phil standing there, leaning against the wall with a trashbag in hand. “For your clothes.” He clarified, when Erin shot him a questioning look. “So you can take them back to the office without having your car smell like slime. You smell a lot better, by the way. Very nice.” He added, his eyes raking over her, desire clear in his eyes.

The redhead felt herself smile at that, gratefully taking the bag from him as he grinned at her, clearly proud of his ingenious idea. “Thank you.” She replied, blushing a little at the compliment. “Do you have any clothes I can borrow?”

“How about we save the clothes for later?” Erin felt herself blush even brighter as he wrapped his arms around her waist, dropping a kiss to her shoulder. “For now, just let me show you how much I like you, all clean like this.” And with that, Erin let herself be dragged off to the bedroom. While Phil’s earlier outburst still lingered in the back of her mind, she forced herself to ignore it. After all, he still liked her as a person; it was just the slime he didn’t like. And truth be told, Erin couldn’t really fault him for that.

As she lay there, faking an orgasm – no, the sex wasn’t great either, but it never really had been to begin with – she decided that next time she’d just have to be more careful about not coming home slimed. She could get cleaned up at the firehouse, easy as pie. It was a small sacrifice to make for love.


	5. Chapter 5

“So?” Abby asked early in the next day, as they all met at the fire station again, “did you have a slime fight with Phil yesterday?”

The question itself was innocent. It was the sort of teasing Erin was used to from her friend, something they could all laugh about. But if you knew that what had really happened wasn’t quite as fun as that, the joke kind of fell flat.

Still, she didn’t want to tell her friends about that, knowing they would think he was treating her terribly, and Erin didn’t feel like explaining to them that he was really just acting like anyone would have. After all, it was to be expected that people who weren’t involved with the Ghostbusting business didn’t have the same love or understanding for the job, and all aspects that went with it.

So Erin tried her best to laugh along with them, but the laughter didn’t reach her eyes, and didn’t quite sound like her laugh usually did.

Holtzmann wondered if she was the only one who noticed that little change. Or the fact that Erin skipped the donuts for breakfast again. Or even that the physicist appeared strangely distracted as they sat at the breakfast table, picking at her sweater instead of drinking the coffee.

Abby even had to say her name three times until she got a reaction.

“Okay, we get it”, the researcher stated once she had finally managed to make Erin pay attention to her, “your head’s all up in Phil-shaped clouds, but this is kind of important, so…?”

“Sorry”, Erin mumbled, trying to shake away the uneasy feeling that hadn’t quite left her since Phil’s outburst from the night before. “I was… distracted. You were saying?”

Abby rolled her eyes, but smiled good-naturedly, and after a moment, Erin smiled back. She just had to put it behind her.

As she made sure to focus on what her best friend was saying afterwards, she missed the way Holtzmann studied her, the engineer’s own coffee and donut forgotten as she once more tried hard to ignore the alarm bells softly ringing away at the far back of her mind.

* * *

 

For the next few days, Holtzmann noticed, Erin didn’t talk as detailed about her dates with Phil anymore; she just said that they had been nice and then changed the topic. And even then, she did that only when she was asked about them first, never speaking about them of her own volition.

This was quite strange, especially after how happy Erin had been the first few times she’d gone out with the guy. Holtzmann still wasn’t sure if she was just overreacting, and so she kept her thoughts about this to herself. She just observed, noting how Erin’s wardrobe slowly, but steadily changed.

First, her high heels replaced her comfortable shoes more and more often. Next, the tweed blazers and blouses – including the tiny bowties – made reappearances every once in a while. Eventually, after a few weeks of gradual changes, Erin actually showed up one day wearing an outfit almost identical to the one she’d had on when Holtzmann had met her for the first time.

“Wow, Dr Gilbert, look at you!” The engineer complimented her practically the moment Erin walked in, for the moment forgetting her almost constant state of dismay about the relationship the physicist had. “So fancy. I’d talk to you at a particle physics convention.”

She smirked and winked at the redhead, and Erin let out a little laugh as she blushed. She shook her head, then straightened her skirt, shrugging as she looked at Holtzmann again, still sounding amused when she replied.

“That takes us back, huh? I almost expected you to ask me if I come here often”, she joked, making Holtzmann smirk again. “I’m kinda glad you didn’t, though,” Erin continued good naturedly. “Because it would have given me  _ such _ a sense of déjà vu.”

“Any particular reason for that kind of outfit?” Holtzmann wanted to know, trying to not appear as if she was watching Erin’s every move when the physicist made her way to the counter and helped herself to some coffee. (Holtzmann noted she yet again ignored the box of donuts. In fact, she wasn’t even looking at it anymore at this point). “Or just a moment of nostalgia when you looked in your wardrobe?”

“I’m meeting Phil after work”, Erin told her, and Holtzmann was glad that she was too focused on fixing her coffee to notice the brief flash of dismay she couldn’t keep from her face. (That was another thing Holtzmann had noticed: Erin didn’t add sugar like she’d used to, but only poured in a splash of milk). “We’re meeting some of his colleagues, and jeans and a sweatshirt didn’t seem appropriate for that.”

“Well, you even make the tweed work, hot stuff”, Holtzmann let her know, smiling at the giggle Erin let out, yet another blush colouring her cheeks. The physicist gave her a look which practically said “Oh, you” – and as she did so, Holtzmann noticed that it had been a while since she actually had gotten that look.

She hid that thought well though, making sure to keep her smile fixed in place.

“Thank you, that’s sweet… I think”, Erin told her, prompting Holtzmann to give the redhead another wink.

When Abby came in, the brunette looked somewhat taken aback by Erin’s choice in clothes. She didn’t comment on it, though, merely giving her quite the unabashed once-over as she got herself some coffee, too. Erin felt a little scrutinized by her friend, but thought nothing of it, merely smiling at her as she asked about their plans for today.

Holtzmann too tried to tell herself everything was fine. There was a perfectly rational explanation for the return of that outfit, after all, so much like everyone else, she actually let it go for a change. Especially considering that the next day, Erin was dressed in one of her flannel shirts and a pair of jeans again, only proving to Holtzmann that she was just being paranoid.

… But the day after that, Erin was wearing what the engineer had dubbed her “professor outfit” again, and it made the alarm bells come back louder than ever.

“Another event with Phil?” She asked, trying her best to sound neutral, like seeing Erin like this wasn’t somewhat unsettling. She couldn’t quite put her finger on why it upset her that the physicist dressed like this again, but the feeling only got worse when Erin shook her head, briefly touching one of the buttons she had closed all the way up to her throat, as if self-conscious about her outfit.

“Oh, you know”, She then said, with a smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes, “I just thought it’d be nice to look more… professional. People are taking us seriously as the Ghostbusters now, we should dress appropriately.”

“I guess”, Holtzmann replied, still a bit doubtful at that explanation. Erin might look professional, but she looked far from comfortable, her whole posture stiff and the way she shifted her feet showing that the heels still weren’t fun to wear. “But if I started doing that, the people would think I was replaced by aliens, so I’ll stick to my regular outfits. As I said though, you make that work, hot stuff.”

“Thank you”, Erin replied, blushing a bit again, her blush only deepening at the smirk and wink combination Holtzmann sent her way. However, the moment Erin turned away from her and moved to her desk, Holtzmann’s face fell. She studied the physicist intently, trying to figure out why it was so upsetting to see Erin like this, and why it made her feel as if something dreadful was happening right in front of her eyes that she just couldn’t see.


	6. Chapter 6

Over the next few days, the Professor Outfits came back in full force, Erin only wearing something different when she was in her coveralls for busts. But if Abby and Patty found it as weird as Holtzmann did, they didn’t say anything to her about it.

Still, the feeling that something was wrong remained, no matter how often Holtzmann told herself that Erin had reasoned perfectly why she dressed like this again, and that the explanation had made perfect sense for the ever self-conscious physicist.

Nevertheless, she found herself observing Erin more and more, though always in such a way that Erin wouldn’t notice; a skill she had perfected after months of looking at the other woman like she was the sun in Holtz’s life. She noticed that when Erin thought that nobody was paying any attention to her, there were flashes of what Holtzmann only could describe as pure, undiluted misery on her face. They were always hidden behind a calm façade rather quickly, but they were there nonetheless, and she knew she had seen them.

She started cataloguing them without even fully realizing she was doing it, mentally noting how often she saw them, and how they seemed to vary in intensity. The later in the day, the unhappier Erin appeared to be, and Holtzmann found herself wondering more and more what this might mean. She noticed, and she wondered, and she asked herself more and more often why she seemed to be the only one who realized that something about Erin was off.

She asked herself equally often if perhaps she was just overreacting. If this was all in her head, spurred on by her jealousy – because, deep inside, she was jealous, and she knew it. She was still jealous that Phil had Erin now, and that it wasn’t her the physicist went out on dates with after work.

And after all, there was one thing still strongly working against her potentially paranoid thoughts, and that was Abby. Abigail Louise Yates, Erin’s best friend, who had known her much longer than Holtzmann had. And so far, Abby didn’t seem as if she was noticing anything out of the ordinary. Surely, if something was really wrong, Abby would be the first to point it out, the other woman never being one to mince her words. So if she was being quiet, then undoubtedly everything was fine.

As a result, Holtzmann tried to convince herself that this was nothing to worry about. _Perhaps,_ she thought to herself, _Erin_ _just had such phases, and Abby knew, and that’s why she didn’t think anything about it._ And she managed to push her worries aside, for a while.

But then, a few weeks after the first time Erin had shown up in full Professor style again, Holtzmann noticed something as they were changing for another bust, something that caused her to be unable to ignore the alarm bells ringing in her head any longer.

Erin’s necklace, the one with the cute little seashell pendant that Holtzmann knew she’d been wearing since she’d gotten it for her eighth birthday, was gone.

While a necklace may not have seemed like a big deal to most people, Holtzmann knew what it meant to Erin. It was one of the few things she still had that reminded her of a time where her parents still believed in her, and the redhead had told her herself that it had been a source of comfort to her throughout her life. It was to Erin what Holtzmann’s Screw U necklace was to her: important enough to take it off only when  _ absolutely _ necessary.

Part of Holtzmann wanted to ask her what had happened to it right away, but she bit the question back. She knew, after all, that the necklace meant much to Erin, and if she brought it up now, Erin might get upset about having lost it. And there was nothing more dangerous than a team member going on a bust upset and distracted.

So despite her worries, Holtzmann held back with the questions. During the bust itself, she had in fact almost forgotten about her concerns, fully focused on Erin and on how radiant the physicist was. It had always been clear to her how much the physicist enjoyed the work she did, the redhead always lighting up and looking incredibly badass – and to Holtzmann, as a result, also incredibly  _ sexy _ – whenever she was blasting away at the ghosts.

Erin used the shotgun Holtzmann had made for her, and when she pulled the trigger and her aim had been just perfect, she smiled in a way which made Holtzmann’s heart tighten in a good way. A good way being not in the odd, constricting way she’d felt when she’d seen Erin wear one of her Professor Outfits for the third day in a row.

“Holtzmann”, Erin told her after one of the ghosts had been blasted into nothingness, bits of ectoplasm splattering to the floor, “I cannot get over how great this gun is. Thank you so much for making it for me.”

“Ah, just wait.”, Holtzmann replied, smiling at how positively radiant the physicist looked. “I’m working on proton shotgun 2.0, that one will be even more kickass. And I can’t wait to see you wielding it, you’ll look so badass.”

Erin’s smile widened in response, and to Holtzmann, it was as if the sun was coming out after days of cloudy weather. She beamed back at the physicist, then they both focused on their work again. Or at least Erin did; Holtzmann was too preoccupied with staring at Erin most of the time. She couldn’t really help herself, though. Erin just looked so damn happy busting ghosts, not a single shred of the misery the engineer had seen on her face the previous days left. She looked so happy that, in fact, Holtzmann started to wonder if she really had seen that strange sadness, or if it had perhaps all been in her head after all.

(She wasn’t quite sure what it would mean for her mental health if it had been, but on the other hand, she’d rather have some problem she could deal with than see Erin truly unhappy about something in her life).

Only once the bust was over, and they were on the way back to the firehouse – and Erin was looking so happy still, in part because just this once, she actually hadn’t gotten slimed – Holtzmann remembered the missing necklace. She almost asked right then and there, but bit the question back. Because again, Erin just looked so happy she really didn’t want to be the one to ruin that moment.

Nevertheless, the empty spot where the little seashell had been hanging before brought Holtzmann’s worries back with full force, and she found herself unable to stop thinking about it. And so, even though she knew she’d feel bad if asking would upset Erin she  _ had _ to ask her about it. Out of respect for the physicist, though, she waited until she had a moment alone with her before doing so, making sure that both Abby and Patty were out of earshot before she spoke up.

“Um, Erin”, she started, making the redhead look at her curiously, “you probably noticed? But… your necklace? It’s missing.”

“Oh yeah”, Erin replied, and there was a flash of  _ something  _ in her eyes, something Holtzmann couldn’t quite name, “I lost it. Aw, it’s sweet that you noticed though.”

And just like that, the topic apparently was done for the physicist. She smiled at Holtzmann, then wandered off to find Abby and Patty and some food ( _ salad or fish _ , a nasty voice whispered at the far back of Holtzmann’s mind,  _ you know that is all she eats since she started dating The Guy, salad and fish _ ).

As the engineer watched her leave, her blood ran cold as belatedly, she realized what she had seen in Erin’s eyes.

_ Dishonesty _ .

Erin had lied. She had to admit it to herself.

Erin Gilbert had just lied to her. And while she had no idea why she would do that, or what  _ exactly _ it meant, she knew very well that whatever it was, it was bad.


	7. Chapter 7

As the days passed, Holtzmann couldn’t stop thinking about how Erin had lied to her about the necklace. Again and again, her gaze moved to the emptiness where the little seashell had been before, the way her mind kept returning to this making her wonder if she was getting creepy and obsessive or if there was something else, something bigger going on.

She was a scientist, though – a mad scientist perhaps, but a scientist nonetheless, with a Dr in front of her name to prove it – and so she did what any good scientist would do when faced with such a question: she observed, and studied.

She already knew that Erin’s eating habits had changed since she’d started dating Phil. Back then, she had assumed the two things coincided coincidentally, but by now she wasn’t so sure the two were unrelated anymore. She had noticed too many changes about Erin since the day she had gotten back together with Phil to put it down as a mere coincidence.

Other than the eating, there was also the way she dressed in Professor Outfits all the time now, complete with tiny bow ties and uncomfortable shoes. There was the way she often just looked so  _ sad _ , when she thought no one was noticing. There was the fact that she was sure Erin had lied about the necklace, even though she still couldn’t figure out why.

And now that she was thinking about it, she also realized that the physicist’s boots – the teal ones with the flower print, the ones that  _ really  _ shouldn’t look good on anyone but which Erin had made look utterly adorable – hadn’t made a reappearance since the bust after which they had dropped her off at Phil’s apartment building. During the last few busts, Erin had simply worn black boots like the other three did.

Holtzmann wondered where her flower boots had gone. She wondered if Erin would lie to her again, should she ask her about them. She wondered if she’d be able to take another lie. It had hurt when Erin had lied to her about the necklace, and the last thing she wanted was risk reacting to the physicist with anger or disappointment.

She somehow suspected that wouldn’t go over well with the other woman.

So she didn’t ask, but simply observed and memorized. And the more she observed, the more she became convinced that something bad was going on. Because Holtzmann knew Erin. Not as well as Abby, granted, but well enough to know that this accumulation of strange things was oddly out of character for her.

She also knew her well enough to be aware that simply walking up to her and asking wouldn’t do any good. If there was something wrong, and if it was something bad, she knew that just asking wouldn’t get her any answers. On the contrary; it’d be more likely that Erin would just shut down or even try to push her away, and that wouldn’t do either of them any good.

Not for the first time, she wondered why no one else seemed to notice anything. Patty just kept asking about the dates and told Erin how happy she was for her, and Abby – while a little more distant than usual – didn’t seem to notice anything out of the ordinary, either.

Maybe it was just all in her head after all?

As a result of her friends’ lack of reaction to Erin’s arguably strange behaviour, Holtzmann kept her worries to herself, just brooding over at them as she worked. Luckily, her dismay had no effect on her work. She was still just as efficient as before – and as prone to create small to medium poofs as before – and the only thing which stopped her was the need for a blowtorch where there was none at hand.

That had made her frown for a moment, before she remembered she had done another dance number with her blowtorches, and Erin had taken them away as a safety measure. The redhead had told her she’d get them back once they could be sure she wouldn’t burn the place down with them, glaring at Holtzmann as she took them away.

“Erin, please”, she muttered to herself, getting up from her seat at the workbench, “I played along when you took them, but you didn’t really think you could keep The Holtzmann from her fire forever, did you?”

She felt a bit smug as she walked downstairs, and even saluted Erin, who just was packing up. The physicist looked a bit confused at the salute, but smiled at her after a moment, then wished her a good evening. Holtzmann held back the urge to call out to her, just to tell her she knew where the blowtorches were hidden and that she was going to get them, because she knew Erin might race her to the hiding place then and hide them somewhere else.

_ Aw, on the other hand, that could have been fun,  _ she thought to herself, before realizing that it really only would have been fun for two minutes at most. After that, Erin would probably twist an ankle from running in those ridiculously uncomfortable shoes of hers.

It was too late anyway, because Erin was already gone, probably headed to another date with the guy.

So, she shrugged her ideas of racing Erin off, and moved to the hidey hole she knew Erin used the most. Quite uncreatively, it was hidden behind her whiteboard, but Holtzmann had to give her props for the location anyway. After all, Erin spent most of her time there, and that way she could watch that stuff like a hawk. Even if she got lost in her equations, she would notice the whiteboard moving, meaning Holtzmann wouldn’t have stood a single chance at getting her blowtorches back if Erin had still been around.

Hence why before Holtzmann got to it, she glanced at the door again, making sure that Erin wasn’t coming back. Only once she had convinced herself the coast was clear, she pushed the whiteboard aside, whistling happily as she found the loose panel in the wall behind it and pulled it away.

“Gotcha”, she said out loud, making Patty glance over from where she sat at her own desk. The historian had been studying a book there until Holtzmann had distracted her, rummaging around behind Erin’s whiteboard and talking quite smugly to herself. “Ah sweet Erin, you’ll have to try harder than that to keep The Holtzmann from her blowtorches.”

“I find it worrisome you call yourself ‘The Holtzmann’”, Patty commented behind her, making the engineer snort. She briefly looked at her, and winked, then bent down to peer into the hidey hole, spotting her blow torches at once. But as she reached for them, something else caught her eye; a weak glimmer of gold at the far back of the hole in the wall.

She frowned, then reached into the hole as far as she could, dismayed that Erin’s arms were so much longer than hers. Her shoulder bumped against the wall, and she huffed as she tried to grab whatever it was, her efforts making Patty look up from her book again, a frown appearing on her face as she saw Holtzmann with her whole arm in the wall.

“Holtzy”, she said, with a shake of her head, “What in the sweet hell are you doing?”

“Glinting thing”, Holtzmann replied, as if that made perfect sense, “There’s a glinting thing hidden behind my blowtorches.” Her eyes lit up as she suddenly thought of something. “Oh, I bet it’s candy. Erin is hiding candy from us! This has to be punished, I’ll share with you.”

“Or it’s electrical wiring and you’ll die”, Patty sighed with a roll of her eyes. “You better be careful, I ain’t gonna do mouth to mouth on you once you drop, just so…”

She kept talking, but Holtzmann didn’t hear her anymore. She had finally gotten hold of the glinting thing with a whoop of excitement, and had pulled it out. As she stared at it, however, the excitement in her eyes quickly faded, making place for confusion and worry instead as she tried to figure out what was going on.

The ‘glinting thing’ she had found wasn’t candy. Far from it, in fact. It was Erin’s seashell necklace, complete with the thin golden chain. It was a bit dusty from the time it had been in the hidey hole, but Holtzmann carefully wiped it clean, staring at it in absolute shock.

“Holtzy?” Patty said, in a tone which suggested she wasn’t saying it the first time. “What is it?”

“Something’s wrong”, Holtzmann blurted in reply, turning to look at her and holding the necklace up.

However, Patty didn’t react to the revelation in the way she had hoped. There was none of the shock and even horror she had felt at finding it. Instead, the other woman only looked confused.

“Erin’s necklace?” The engineer tried to clear things up. “The one she said she lost? She lied about that. Why would she do that?”

“Maybe she put it in there and forgot.”, Patty hazarded, simultaneously shrugging, clearly not caring much. “Or it fell in there when she hid your torches. Man Holtzy, I know you don’t take it well she’s dating Phil, but this is just grasping at straws. Don’t be like that. Put that back in there before Erin gets back.”

The historian shook her head and picked her book up again, not waiting to see if Holtzmann actually did what she had suggested; she didn’t really want to get involved in this, not wanting to risk fuelling Holtzmann’s clear paranoia.

After a moment, when she was sure Patty wasn’t looking, Holtzmann let the necklace glide into her pocket instead, then grabbed her blowtorches and headed back upstairs without another word. Blowtorches back in her possession, she went back to working and brooding, wondering for what seemed like the millionth time if Patty was right and if she was just being paranoid, or if all her concern was justified (and what it might mean for Erin if it was).


	8. Chapter 8

Holtzmann had hidden the necklace up in her lab, in a hiding place no one else knew about, and hadn’t told Patty about it. The blonde was a bit hurt about how easily the historian had dismissed her worries. She still wasn’t sure if she was overreacting and paranoid – if her jealousy was making her see things which weren’t there, or if she really had a reason to be concerned – but it would have been nice to have a friend to talk about this with either way. It really hadn’t been a nice feeling to have the person she had confided to about her hopeless crush on Erin shrug her words off like that.

So she didn’t tell Patty that she had hidden the necklace, and had told herself that she wouldn’t bring it up again.

The second part of that plan was ruined fairly quickly though, when Erin came in the next morning and Holtzmann noticed a glint of silver around her neck which hadn’t been there before.

Of course Patty picked up on it, too, always having had an eye for new jewellery.

“Oh Erin, new necklace?” she asked at once, while Erin poured herself a coffee. (No donut again, but by now, that wasn’t even surprising anymore). “Let me guess, a gift from Phil?”

“Oh, yes”, Erin replied, smiling as she added milk to her coffee (again, no sugar), then turned to look at the historian, taking careful hold of the necklace and pulling the pendant out of where so far it had been hidden beneath her tightly buttoned blouse.

Holtzmann found herself looking too, even though she didn’t really want to see the tacky stuff the man surely had gotten her. She had established long ago that the only good taste he had was that he was dating Erin, and even though she didn’t really have a  _ lot _ of proof to support that theory, Holtzmann was pretty convinced of her reasoning.

She had been expecting a heart, or half a heart, or something equally kitschy to be dangling from the silver chain around Erin’s neck. What she hadn’t expected was the pendant Erin actually showed to them, the alarm bells going off again in her head as she looked at it.

It was a silver lock, and the clasp sort of looked like a lock, too, and try as she might, Holtzmann couldn’t figure out how this was supposed to be romantic in any way.

“He’s got the key, isn’t that sweet”, Erin was explaining, and Holtzmann wanted to yell that _no, it was not sweet, it was kind of creepy and a bit disgusting, and she would never have the_ nerve _to hang a_ lock _around Erin’s neck._ To her endless horror though, Patty nodded along, and even smiled. Worse; it didn’t even look as if she was faking it for Erin’s sake, and Holtzmann felt herself grow a little sick at that.

“Patty”, Holtzmann hissed the moment Erin was out of earshot, “you can’t be serious. You think that is sweet? It’s a goddamn lock, how is that sweet?”

“He’s a middle-aged white dude.”, Patty replied with a roll of her eyes, “He thinks that kinda stuff is sweet. Besides, Erin likes it too. Jesus, Holtzy, I love you, but you have to let that go. He’s not the Devil incarnate.”

“Whatever”, Holtzmann practically growled, still creeped out. Nevertheless, she quickly glanced in the direction of Erin’s desk, making sure the physicist hadn’t heard her, before stomping upstairs to her own work, Patty shaking her head as she looked after her.

“Girl, I know you got it bad”, The historian then mumbled to herself, “but this is getting ridiculous.”

Unaware of Patty’s assessment of the situation, Holtzmann worked upstairs for a while, creating one small poof which caused Erin to call out “Holtz?”, and made her reply “I’m okay!”, even though right now she was feeling  _ far _ from okay. That had nothing to do with the poof, however, so she didn’t see it fit to mention that to Erin.

After lunch (during which Erin had eaten salad again, because of course she had), she went to her hiding place and pulled out Erin’s necklace, looked at it and let the fine gold chain run through her fingers. She wondered why the physicist would want to trade such a beautiful thing for the not nearly as pretty one Phil had given her.

_ A goddamn lock,  _ she thought to herself, still finding the idea quite disturbing. She shook her head to herself as she heard Erin’s voice in her mind again, claiming that he had the key, as if she was some sort of treasure chest only he had the right to unlock.

Holtzmann had seen Phil only a handful of times so far, but she didn’t like him, and now found him creepy, too. She was seriously asking herself what kind of person would give their significant other a necklace as creepy as that one, and what that said about their relationship. Because try as she might, Holtzmann could find nothing even remotely cute or romantic about it, and she had been sure Erin would have shared that opinion with her.

Or at least, the Erin before Phil would have.

With a heavy sigh, Holtzmann put the necklace back in hiding, deciding that she wouldn’t confront Erin about this just now. For all she knew, she never might, but she wanted to keep the piece of jewellery safe anyway, just in case. After all, Erin must have hidden it for a reason, even if Holtzmann was still completely lost as to what that reason might be.

She wasn’t even entirely sure she  _ wanted _ to find out anymore.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys, ForxGood here, with 2 lil points:  
> 1\. The necklace from the previous chapter ACTUALLY exists, and a picture of it can be found here [http://www.polyvore.com/cgi/img-thing?.out=jpg&size=l&tid=134476133]  
> 2\. Chapter sizes will slowly but steadily increase from this point onward. Shit is finally starting to go down. Brace yourselves.

Figuring that she might as well get some more work done, Holtzmann tried her best to focus, and managed to get through the rest of the day without any more poofs. She still felt grumpy by the time she went downstairs to get ready for going home, but felt a bit better when Erin was still there, standing at her whiteboard and frowning at her equations. And even though Holtzmann knew the creepy necklace was still there, at least it was beneath Erin’s blouse and she didn’t need to see it.

“Hey Dr Gilbert”, she said, amused when Erin jumped a bit before she turned to look at her, “Fancy still seeing you here. Sorry, didn’t mean to startle you.”

“It’s okay”, Erin smiled at her, capping her marker and putting it down onto the desk, “but I’m not going to be here for much longer, I’m just waiting for Phil to pick me up.”

“Ah”, Holtzmann let out, once more trying hard not to let her dismay about this relationship show, “Nice.”

Erin smiled at her and nodded, then asked how her work had gone upstairs. The two talked for a while, getting absorbed enough by the conversation that they didn’t even hear the front door opening, Erin jumping again when Phil’s voice called out to her quite unexpectedly.

“Erin”, The man complained as he found them at the bottom of the stairs, “I’ve knocked the door five times, didn’t you hear?”

“Sorry, Phil”, Erin replied at once, and something about her tone made the alarm bells in Holtzmann’s mind come back.

His reaction to the apology only caused their volume to increase, as he waved her words away with a dismissive hand gesture. “Come on, babe, let’s go.”, he then said, the way he said _babe_ making Holtzmann’s skin crawl, her gaze hardening as she stared at him. He was talking to Erin as if she was some sort of dog, ordering her around like a pet rather than a partner. What was worse, Erin didn’t even seem to mind it, simply obeying without question.

“You can talk more to Dr Holdsback here tomorrow, you see her every day anyway.” He added, as Erin shot Holtzmann an apologetic smile before all but running to his side, kissing his cheek with a smile on her face.

“It’s Holtzmann”, Holtzmann corrected him, wondering what kind of boyfriend didn’t know their names after the time Erin and him had been dating. Certainly, Erin must have talked about them when she was out with the man. She probably said their names quite regularly, considering the fact that they, you know, _worked together_. As a _family_.

Phil did his dismissive-wave-thing again while Erin hurriedly grabbed her bag, before moving to her boyfriend’s side again. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Holtz”, she said, smiling at her, and Holtzmann found it a bit difficult to give a genuine smile back. Especially when Phil, instead of taking Erin’s hand like the engineer had expected him to, took hold of her arm instead, right above the elbow – and a bit harder than it perhaps was comfortable for Erin, too. The physicist didn’t protest or even react in the slightest, just walking along with him, and that somehow made the situation even worse for Holtzmann.

_Like she’s used to it._

The thought flashed through Holtzmann’s brain out of nowhere, and made a shiver run down her spine. She wondered if anyone should be used to being grabbed like that by their partner, as if they were about to be escorted away by the police, and all at once, all the things she had noticed ever since this relationship had started came back up in her mind. The eating, the clothes, the fake laughter, the necklace…

Holtzmann frowned, as now she found herself unable to push those thoughts back down. The alarm bells were going absolutely crazy in her mind, screaming _wrong, wrong, wrong_ over and over again in her head. And try as she might, she couldn’t block them out.

“Google’s your friend, Holtzy”, she said out loud, before rushing back upstairs to grab her laptop.

She reasoned that, if she really was just jealous and paranoid, a Google search would point that out to her. And that way, she’d be able to focus on handling this problem, rather than keep obsessing about it.

Out of habit, she cracked her fingers as she booted up her laptop, stretching before placing her fingers on the keyboard. She kept them there for a good few minutes, wondering how to phrase this, before typing _Friend acts strange since new relationship_ into the search bar and hitting enter.

She pushed her tinted glasses back up her nose as she peered at the screen. She’d never been a big fan of computer screens, and even though her glasses helped a bit, looking at them for longer than an hour more often than not gave her quite the headache.

The results, at the first glance, weren’t all too helpful. Most of them just seemed to reinforce that Holtzmann was just jealous, but there was still a nagging feeling that that wasn’t all it was. And a good researcher never took a sample size of one, so instead of letting it go, Holtzmann rephrased her search to an actual question: _Is it normal for my friend to act weird since she got a new relationship?_

The first result immediately caught her eye, her breath catching in her throat as she read the link title. ‘A Toxic Friend: Signs He or She Is Using and Abusing You’. Her initial reaction was to wonder if perhaps she was mistreating Erin without knowing it.

That specific article didn’t provide Holtzmann with much information; after all, as far as she could remember, she had never tried to put Erin down of make her feel bad or guilty about anything. In fact, she could only really remember doing the opposite, complementing the beautiful and brilliant physicist whenever she could. Was that really wrong of her?

Deciding she needed more information, she clicked the third link (‘6 Toxic Relationship Habits Most People Think Are Normal’) and began to read that as well. As far as she could tell, she was doing _none_ of that to Erin, and was about to wonder if she was actually just slowly losing her mind, when something seemed to click inside her brain.

What if _she_ wasn’t the one abusing Erin? What if it was someone else?

Holtzmann’s hand froze on the mouse, and for a moment, she could only stare, her mouth having gone completely dry from one second to the next. The mere thought made her feel sick to her stomach, and she wanted nothing more now than to slam her laptop shut and run away. She didn’t even want to _consider_ the idea that someone might be mistreating her friend, but she knew it was too late. The seed had been planted in her head, and all she could do now was try her damndest to convince herself she was wrong. That the first search had been right, and that she really just was being jealous and a terrible person.

Her fingers were trembling, and it took her a few tries to type the phrase _Is my friend in an abusive relationship_ into the search bar, feeling her heart race as she hit enter.

One of the first links was a sort of list with signs, and as she clicked it, Holtzmann told herself that she’d just look at that to reassure herself that this wasn’t happening. Not to Erin. She was just reading it to convince herself that she was the terrible person in this equation, that she was just being paranoid and jealous, and that everything with Erin was absolutely fine.

For the first three points of the list, that reasoning even worked, what with them being about how the victim might be injured, neglecting beauty-habits and wearing clothing to hide bruising. Sure, Erin’s look had changed, but it was still weather-appropriate, and if anything, Erin took _more_ care to look good rather than less. She also hadn’t had any wounds the engineer couldn’t explain, so really, she had just been overreacting.

Then Holtzmann got to the fourth point, and all the air seemed to get sucked out of the room.

  1. _On the flipside of appearance changes, a victim’s looks may “improve.”_



She felt sick again, thinking about the return of the Professor Outfits as she read on, her unease only growing as she studied the description of the aforementioned point.

_‘If she's not immaculate, she's embarrassingly unacceptable to him. He has boiled down her self-worth to how good she looks on his arm. He snidely comments on what she eats and wears.’_

Holtzmann thought back on Erin’s eating habits, her skipping snacks, her lighter lunches, the lack of sugar in her coffee, and then didn’t want to think about how well that all fit. _It is just one thing,_ she tried to tell herself, in a voice that sounded oddly like Erin’s. _One datapoint does not a proper conclusion make, Dr Holtzmann._

So she kept reading, trying her hardest not to throw up over her laptop as she read the next ‘sign’.

  1. _The abused woman is significantly less social._



Erin had been more quiet lately, and had actually cancelled a few more movie nights over the past week. She also had rushed out very quickly today, when she had been very much in the middle of a conversation with Holtzmann. But then Erin’s voice sounded again, telling her that two datapoints could still just be a coincidence. _You need a proper sample size, Dr Holtzmann._

But the more she kept reading, the more that voice began to be drowned out by the sound of the alarm bells that had been ringing away in Holtzmann’s head for the past month and a half now, as she found herself ticking more and more points off that list.

Because _fuck_ , Erin _was_ less confident, her body language _had_ changed, she _was_ continuously distracted or preoccupied. She may not be on her phone all the time, but Holtzmann had noticed how she had only been talking about Phil when prompted to lately. Add that to the fact that she all but rushed to his side as soon as he arrived, and the fact that she had openly lied to Holtzmann about the necklace…

By the time she had reached the final point ( _20\. She fakes her emotions_ , and fuck it if Erin’s stupid little cocktail party-esque laugh didn’t still haunt Holtzmann on a daily basis) she started to feel oddly detached, sitting back and looking at the screen in an abnormal state of calm.

“Well”, she said out loud, knowing no one else was around to hear her, and glad for it too, as she could feel her voice trembling. “that’s that, then.”

Her hand was steady as she reached out and bookmarked the page – for future reference, she thought. And as she thought that, the truth of what she just had read hit her with full force, and she slammed her laptop shut in a sudden flash of panic. She vaguely registered a cracking sound, a small voice telling her she should probably fix that tomorrow, but it was almost completely drowned out by the one thing currently at the forefront of her mind.

“No”, she brought out, in a trembling, unsteady voice, feeling sick to her stomach again, “no no no no. That’s not true, I’m just being jealous and paranoid. Patty said so. That’s not true, Erin’s not… She can’t…”

She broke off and took a deep breath – and then she slumped in her seat and buried her face in her hands. She just sat there in the dark for a long while, her mind reeling as she tried to tell herself over and over again that this wasn’t true, that this wasn’t happening to Erin, _not to Erin_. But no matter how hard she tried, she just couldn’t manage to convince herself of that, the alarm bells still blaring away in her head.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you repeat the google searches you should get the exact same results Holtz did, down to the 20 point list for your reading pleasure; I (ForxGood) did my research.   
> The list itself can be found here [http://elitedaily.com/women/seeing-social-butterflys-demise-domestic-abuse-beyond-black-eyes/1020109], and is a pretty accurate depiction of domestic abuse signs. While I've been excited to post this chapter due to everyone's potential reactions, this is also still a serious topic, and if you notice someone exhibiting those signs try and talk to them about it. Also know both Dreamshaper and I are here to talk should you any of you need the support.


	10. Chapter 10

When Erin came in to work the next day, Holtzmann made a point of greeting her extra-nicely and with an especially bright smile. She didn’t quite feel it – she felt tired and drained, because after what she had read the previous night, she hadn’t gotten much sleep – but she wanted to make Erin smile first thing in the morning. But she was glad to see it worked, the physicist appearing a bit surprised at her enthusiastic greeting, but touched as well.

“Good morning to you, too, Holtz”, she replied with a grin as she put her bag down onto her chair, “You seem to be in a good mood today.”

_I’m in the worst mood because I’m so, so scared that this man is treating you horribly and I don’t know how to ask if he is but I do know that you wouldn’t tell me even if I knew._

“Ah, yes”, the words which came out of her mouth were quite different from the ones which had been going through her head, “it’s a lovely day, don’t you agree?”

Erin let out a vaguely agreeing noise as she helped herself to coffee, giving the engineer another smile though as she sat down at the table with her. Abby and Patty came in shortly afterwards, and if Erin noticed that the engineer greeted them not quite as enthusiastically, she didn’t comment on it.

They had breakfast together, as they did every day, then all moved to their respective areas for their work. Holtzmann started the day with fixing her laptop screen, which she indeed had cracked when she had slammed the poor machine shut the previous evening, just to give Erin some time to get fully immersed in her work. When she was certain Erin would be lost in her little world of numbers, she went to find Patty, telling herself that she had to tell someone about what she had learned, so they could do something about it.

“Patty”, she started, her voice low as she approached the historian, taking extra care that Erin wouldn’t hear her. Patty just raised an eyebrow at her, before she shook her head, giving the blonde a strict look.

“If this is about Erin and her guy”, she then said, Holtzmann’s heart sinking at the strict tone, “I don’t want to hear it.”

“But Patty”, Holtzmann tried again, “I—”

“Holtzy, no”, Patty shook her head, her gaze softening afterwards, “Look, I know this is hard for you, but you have to let this go.”

This wouldn’t lead anywhere, Holtzmann realized. If she told Patty what she had found out the previous evening – provided she could even get a word in to begin with –it’d only be dismissed as jealousy and paranoia again. Or worse; maybe Patty would even tell Erin, and then Erin would start avoiding her, and she wouldn’t be able to help her at all anymore.

“… Fine”, she thus said, turning to head back upstairs. She briefly considered talking to Abby, but ever since Erin had started dating Phil again, and especially since the Professor Outfits were back, Abby and the physicist seemed somewhat less close.

As a result, Holtzmann wasn’t quite sure if the researcher wouldn’t dismiss her the way Patty had.

_Proof,_ she thought to herself, in a voice that again sounded suspiciously like Erin’s. _I need proof. I need to collect data. You’re a scientist, Holtzmann, so approach this like one._

She hurried back upstairs and, in one of her desk drawers, found an unused notebook and a pen. She made sure that no one was coming upstairs to catch her doing this, then opened the notebook, somehow managing to keep her hand steady even though her heart clenched up at what she was writing.

_Question: Is Erin in an abusive relationship?_

_Hypothesis: ~~Phil is a dick~~ Certain changes have been observed since Erin started dating Phil, is he abusing her or am I just paranoid and jealous_

Holtzmann paused for a moment after writing this, her small, somewhat messy handwriting blurring as tears stung in her eyes at the mere thought of the answer to her question being Yes. She took in a deep, controlled breath, then started writing again, noting down all the changes she had witnessed since this relationship had begun.

_Datapoints observed pre- 17/3/2017_

_Changed eating habits – no more snacks, no more donuts, stopped taking her coffee with sugar. Often fish or salad for lunch while we eat unhealthy (but yummy) stuff._

_Professor Outfits are back all the time now – see point 4 of list attached._

_Teal flower boots are gone without a trace, replaced by standard issue black boots._

_Often looks sad when she thinks nobody is looking._

_Claimed to have lost seashell necklace she had since she was 8, found it in hiding place with my blowtorches. Replaced by lock necklace given by Phil to which he has the key. Lied about having lost it. Plays into point 4 too? Perhaps he didn’t like it._

That was an assumption, not a fact, and Holtzmann knew she perhaps shouldn’t put it in there; it felt oddly right though, and so, she left it there, having to take a few more deep breaths before she could continue.

_Apologized immediately when he got pissy about her still talking to colleagues (me) when he came to pick her up. Apology not acknowledged by him. Grabbed her arm like policeman taking away criminal when they left. No discernible reaction to this from Erin (used to it?)_

Holtzmann was sure that more would come to her, should she think about it, but at the moment, her heart already hurt too much to let her, and so she quit writing for now. She wasn’t entirely done yet though, finishing up by printing out the list she had found online and folding it up before she put it into the notebook. The notebook itself she hid at the bottom of one of her desk drawers, not wanting anyone to find it. At least not for now.

“Holtzy!” she heard Patty call from downstairs just as she closed the drawer, and she flinched, as if she had done something wrong and had been caught. But that was crazy, there was no way Patty could know about her project. She herself hadn’t known until this morning, and while Patty was perceptive, she wasn’t that perceptive.

(She hadn’t even noticed Erin was acting strangely, and that was just glaringly obvious)

So she shook her head as she got up from her chair, hoping that her eyes weren’t red and giving her away as she called back “Yeah, what?”.

“Bust!” Patty called out, and that made feel Holtzmann decidedly better. She remembered how happy Erin had been at the last bust, and she wanted to see her that happy again, instead of that sad look she had noticed whenever Erin thought no one was looking at her.

“Coming”, she gave back, hurriedly wiping at her eyes, just to make sure. At least the tinted glasses, she figured, would hide any redness which might be left.

Apparently it worked, nobody looking at her oddly when she slid down the pole and landed with a resounding thump of her boots.

“A family called us”, Erin filled them in on the details of the bust as they all changed into their coveralls and geared up, and the excitement and energy in her voice made Holtzmann feel all warm and tingly inside. “They inherited their aunt’s house and moved in, but apparently, the aunt hasn’t moved out and is haunting them. Malevolent, and likes to throw stuff at people, so we better be careful.”

She gave Holtzmann a pointed look at the last few words, and the engineer responded by looking behind her – as if there could be anyone else Erin could be looking at – and whistling innocently. The physicist shook her head and laughed at the blonde’s antics, and Holtzmann brightly grinned back at her, happy to see Erin so happy and amused. At least for now, the sadness she had so often spotted there over the past weeks was gone, and Holtz would take that victory any day of the week.

* * *

 

“Okay, if I ever have enough cash to own a house that big and die, I’ll haunt it, too”, Patty declared as they got out of Ecto-1 at the house they had been called to. Erin gave her a mortified look, due to their client standing at the entrance door of said house. The redhead was always eager to make a good impression, and lucky for her, the man didn’t seem to have heard Patty. He just looked relieved at their appearance.

“Okay, this place is big indeed.” The physicist said, after greetings had been exchanged and she had reassured the man they would take care of his ghost problem. “We better split up. Abby and Patty, you take the second floor and the attic; Holtz, you and me go through the ground floor and cellar?”

“Fine with me, hot stuff”, Holtzmann gave back at once, winking when Erin’s cheeks flushed. Their client looked a bit put off by this not exactly professional behaviour, but refrained from commenting, merely unlocking the door and wishing them good luck as he let them in.

Just as it had been decided, they split up in teams of two; Abby and Patty heading up the stairs while Erin and Holtzmann remained on the ground floor. They checked the kitchen first, wary of pots and pans which might be used as ammunition against them, and somewhat relieved when no utensils came flying at them. They then moved on to the living room and the downstairs bathroom.

“Either she’s up there where Abby and Patty are”, Erin stated once they had moved through the whole ground floor and had found no trace of the ghost, “or she’s in the cellar. We better go check.”

“Lead the way, cupcake”, Holtzmann replied, making Erin blush again. The physicist gave the engineer a strict look, then got moving again, sneaking down the stairs with Holtzmann right behind her. The blonde was glancing over her shoulder every other step to make sure the ghost wouldn’t rush them from behind and throw them down the stairs.

As it turned out, the ghost _was_ ready to ambush them, but not the way the engineer had feared. The moment Erin reached the bottom of the stairs, the dead aunt materialized right in front of her, and before she had the chance to aim her proton gun, the quite angry looking ghost unhinged her jaw and started to spew slime at her.

Holtzmann reflexively ducked down, but still got a few globs of the stuff onto her coveralls and hair. As per usual, most of it hit Erin though, clinging to her hair, face and upper body. When the ghost vanished again, shooting through the ceiling with a loud cackle, the physicist was yet again practically covered in the stuff, ectoplasm dripping off her body to the floor.

“Auntie is pissed”, Holtzmann observed as she removed a little glob of ectoplasm from her glasses, chuckling a little at the sight of Erin. No matter how often it happened, there had always been something incredibly funny about the way the uptight physicist always seemed to end up covered in green goo.

As Holtzmann put her glasses back on, however, she realized that Erin was just standing there, staring down at herself, her breath coming on odd, quick bursts. This was a reaction to getting slimed Holtzmann had never witnessed from her before. Usually the physicist would just groan, or complain, or sigh in annoyance. Quite a few times, Holtzmann hadn’t even seem the slime stop her from doing her job, Erin just wiping the worst of it out of her face before she proceeded to kick some serious ghost ass with Holtzmann’s proton shotgun.

She had never seen Erin react with what could only be described as a panic-attack before.

“Erin?” she said, concerned, stepping closer to the physicist. Erin took in another gasp-like breath in response, a visible shudder running through her afterwards, her face paling drastically.

“Oh God”, she said before Holtzmann could ask her what was wrong, if she had been hurt, “Jesus no, why did this have to happen today, why today, I’m having lunch with Phil and he finds this so disgusting he hates this stuff he’s gonna…”

She fell silent as she ran out of air, and Holtzmann’s heart clenched up. She forced any thoughts about how Erin might have finished that sentence if her obvious panic hadn’t constricted her throat aside, telling herself that her first and foremost concern had to be the physicist now, quickly holstering her proton gun before she moved closer to the redhead.

“Erin”, she said, giving her best to sound calm and soothing, “it’s okay, it’s okay. There’ll be enough time to get rid of this stuff. I bet Abby and Patty are taking care of that ghost right now, and we can go back to HQ soon and you can clean up.”

She wasn’t sure if she was saying the right things, but at least she wasn’t saying the wrong things either, as Erin didn’t seem to get worse. She was still breathing in harsh, hectic gasps though, and Holtzmann feared that she might start hyperventilating and faint. She carefully put one hand on the other woman’s shoulder, ready to pull back the moment Erin would show any sort of discomfort at the touch.

“Erin, honey…”, she said, using the pet name without thinking, daring to rub her shoulder and back when the initial touch brought no negative reaction. “It’s okay. Just… don’t breathe like that, you’re gonna make yourself faint. Here, breathe like me.”

She moved so that she was in front of the physicist, in her field of view, and gave her best to breathe slow and controlled. She felt somewhat strange doing so, but it appeared to help, the panic slowly fading from Erin’s eyes as she worked hard to match her breathing to Holtzmann’s, the engineer smiling at her reassuringly when she realized it was working.

“Yes, good”, She encouraged, reaching out to rub her back again, “Just like that, you’re doing great.”

To her relief, the shaking subsided as well, and some of the colour returned to Erin’s face. The physicist took in a few more deep breaths, then seemed to calm down fully – only for her gaze to drop down to the ground, her cheeks reddening.

Holtzmann felt her heart clench up again when she realized what was happening, how Erin was shutting down on her again.

“I’m sorry”, Erin mumbled, all at once finding it impossible to look the engineer in the eye, “that was… stupid. I’m sorry.”

“No”, Holtzmann told her at once, her mind immediately going to very unpleasant places again. Because what would Erin have said about what Phil was going to do if she hadn’t cut herself off? What had Phil said to Erin that made the woman have a _panic attack_ as a result of getting slimed? And what on Earth had she gone through with that guy to make her think she now had to apologize for having a panic attack?

“You have nothing to be sorry for”, she added, suddenly eager to get her point across. With that, she felt as if rubbing Erin’s back wasn’t enough, and thus moving in for a hug.

When she noticed, Erin began to protest almost immediately, starting to say “No Holtz, don’t, I’m dis—” before the blonde’s arms wrapped around her, effectively shushing her. She still stiffened in the embrace at first, something which did not go unnoticed by Holtzmann, but she relaxed rather quickly, taking in a shuddery breath as she hid her face against the smaller woman’s shoulder.

And Holtzmann was somewhat glad that Erin was doing so. Not just because she let the hug happen, but because this kept Erin from looking at her face; more specifically, it kept Erin from seeing the shock and horror in her features. By now, Holtzmann was sure Erin would have misread that expression as being directed at her, and not at the thing she almost had said before Holtzmann had cut her off with the hug.

_I’m disgusting._

Holtzmann was sure that this was what Erin would have said, had she let her finish talking. Not _This is disgusting,_ not _I’m covered in slime,_ but _I’m disgusting,_ and her heart broke for what felt like the fiftieth time since she had started to suspect how bad things actually might be.

_Christ, Erin. What is this guy doing to you?_


	11. Chapter 11

It wasn’t too long after that when Erin cancelled her first bust, something which Holtzmann only found out about when she arrived at the house in question at 2:30 in the morning, only spotting Abby and Patty there, both in full gear.

“Where’s Erin?” She asked, watching the other two women getting ready to go inside. “Did she run on ahead again?”

It wouldn’t be the first time Erin went in without backup, much too excited about the prospect of busting another ghost to wait for the others to get ready, calling the other girls ‘slowpokes’ and challenging the last one in the house to buy dinner that evening. Holtzmann loved that side of Erin, and felt her heart skip a beat every time Erin looked over her shoulder and laughed at them, as excited about ghostbusting as a kid was about Christmas.

(Now that she thought about it, she hadn’t seen Erin do that in a while now. She made a mental note to add that to her notebook later.)

The look Abby shot her, however, was enough to tell her that that wasn’t the case. “She cancelled.” The woman spoke coolly, Patty placing a sympathetic hand on her shoulder. “Apparently her boyfriend is more important than a Class II haunting.”

Holtzmann felt her blood run cold at that, Patty’s next words only barely registering. “What she means to say is that Phil got a nasty case of flu, and she’s taking care of him. Ain’t nothing wrong with that in my opinion. Now let’s go; that ghost isn’t going to bust itself.”

“Yeah… Sure.” She stammered out, following Abby and Patty inside, trying her hardest to focus on the bust, and not on the fact that Erin wasn’t there. Or worse, on _why_ Erin wasn’t there. Was Phil really sick? Was Erin just being a good girlfriend? Or was there something more going on. Was he just not _letting_ her go on busts?

Holtzmann assumed it couldn’t be that big of a secret to him that Erin loved her job, that she loved kicking ass like that. And if her research had told her anything, it was that abusers liked to isolate their victims – and fuck fucking _shit_ , Erin was a _victim_ now – and take away things they enjoyed doing.

Still, she tried telling herself that this was just her being paranoid. People skipped busts sometimes, even Erin. It was just one bust, it was nothing to worry about.

But it didn’t just stay with one bust. It soon became very clear to Holtzmann that Erin simply wasn’t allowed to go on midnight busts anymore. And though the redhead always seemed to have an excuse ready – she had a migraine, Phil needed help with something, it was only a Class I/II/III and they could handle that without her – Holtzmann _knew_ that Erin was lying.

Eventually they just stopped calling Erin at night, and Holtzmann had felt her heart break the first time it had happened. She did still shoot Erin a short text though, which read ‘ _On our way to a bust. Class 3. Wish you could be here :(‘_ , to which Erin had responded with a simple ‘Good luck’ and a smiley face.

It had only made the engineer feel worse.

And as if that wasn’t enough, Erin had also started cancelling free time activities with the other three women more and more; in favour of Phil, Holtzmann suspected.

Of course, the physicist never outright said it, but still Holtzmann was sure that this was why she’d not to go the bar with them or leave early when the rest of them had movie night. The fact that Erin had been checking her phone on a more regular basis, even when she usually spent hours getting lost in her work, only proved to confirm that theory ( _#9_ , she wryly thought, as she ticked that box off her list and wondered how long she’d have to keep this up before she could convince Abby and Patty to get Erin the hell out of there).

When she had started her data collection, she had been hoping that she wouldn’t add anything else to it any time soon. She had hoped that perhaps, she’d have an epiphany of sorts at some point and realize that it all had been in her head after all, caused by jealousy. But by now it was becoming painfully clear that that wasn’t the case. Holtzmann found herself adding more and more things to her notebook, the data she was adding slowly getting more frightening and disconcerting the more pages of the notebook were getting filled.

It made the blonde look forward to late-afternoon busts, knowing that not only would Erin get to be her badass self again for a while, but she would also be home late, meaning she had to spend less time with _him_. Because not only had Erin grown quieter and quieter as the days went by, but she had become oddly jumpy, too, flinching whenever someone said her name too loud or made unexpected movements in her direction.

Of course she had her suspicions about the jumpiness and the flinching, but tried to ignore those at first, not wanting to dwell on what it might mean – not wanting to imagine Phil actually physically abusing the redhead. Still, she was all too aware that just this was what might be happening to her, behind closed doors and where no one was there to witness or to help her, point #2 of the list still burned in her mind.

When the flinching became too frequent to ignore, her scientific mind led her to a sort of experiment, one she felt absolutely terrible about performing.

She asked Erin for help with something, joking around with her at first, just to get her to smile – because she was smiling less now, too – and once Erin appeared at least a bit more relaxed than usual, Holtzmann said “oh, and you better not let go until I’m done, or I’ll have to punish you” and winked, her heart and stomach clenching up simultaneously at how drastically Erin paled.

“Ah, relax”, she hurried to say, giving her best to keep the cheerful tone in her voice even though her heart hurt, “I’m kidding. Just hold this, alright?”

“Sure, of course”, Erin replied, with a nervous laugh so fake that Holtzmann almost winced at hearing it. Somehow, she held the noise back, and somehow, she kept how much this hurt form showing on her face, even managing a smile by the time she had gotten done and told Erin she could let go now.

“Thanks for the help, hot stuff”, she added, “you did great.”

Erin gave her a smile which didn’t reach her eyes, shrugged and returned to her whiteboard; and it took Holtzmann almost a full minute to realize what had made her so uneasy about the physicist’s response.

Erin hadn’t blushed.

The engineer nearly dropped her screwdriver as this realization hit her, her mouth going dry and her heart skipping a beat before it started racing in her chest. Ever since they had met and she had said “Come here often?”, Erin had always blushed when she had complimented her or had called her “hot stuff”. _Always._ Without fail.

She didn’t want to imagine what the lack of this response might mean, and before she could stop herself, she got up from her seat and walked to where Erin was standing, sounding uncharacteristically hesitant when she said “Hey Erin?”

The physicist gave her a questioning look as she turned from the whiteboard to look at her, her eyes kind and gentle. She was probably wondering if there was anything else Holtzmann needed help with, and not for the first time the engineer found herself wondering how someone could possibly mistreat a person as wonderful as Erin. Here she was, working away at her own equations, but looking all too happy to help the blonde anyway.

“Um”, Holtzmann started, earning her a confused look from the physicist, “is… is everything okay?”

For a split second, something akin to fear flickered in Erin’s eyes, but it was gone before Holtzmann could take a close enough look at it. “Sure”, Erin replied at once, just a bit too fast, “everything’s fine.”

She gave the blonde another smile, one which didn’t quite reach her eyes, and Holtzmann swallowed heavily. She had known that asking directly wouldn’t lead her anywhere, but part of her still had hoped that, maybe, just maybe…

“Well, you know”, She made herself say, even though all she wanted to do was hug Erin and tell her that she knew, she _knew_ and it was going to be fine and she could tell her and then she’d help her, “If… you know, if anything… if there’s anything you’d might wanna talk about at some point, you know I’m here for you right?”

She noticed Erin paused at that for a few seconds, could see the cogs in her mind turning, and for a split second, Jillian Holtzmann dared to hope. But then Erin smiled at her, that fake smile she had come to see so much more often now, and replied with a breezy “I know.” She was careful to sound as if there was nothing at all bothering her, and Holtzmann slumped off again, giving Erin one last smile before returning to her work.

As Erin watched her go, she swallowed the tears she knew would fall if she didn’t manage to keep this up. Because she knew that for a moment there, she almost _had_ said something. She had almost told Holtzmann how unhappy she was, how bad Phil had been treating her almost constantly the past few weeks, how much her ribs hurt whenever she breathed in too deeply because he had lost his temper a few nights ago after too much wine at a faculty get-together.

But then she had heard his voice, reminding her that they didn’t really care about her anyway, only put up with her until they found someone better suited for the job. So certainly, Holtzmann was only asking to be polite, and didn’t really care about what may or may not be wrong with Erin. She surely had better things to do than listen to her whine about her insignificant problems with her love life.

_They don’t care for you like I do, Erin, they don’t need you around. You know I’m the only who’ll ever truly care for you, right? You know how I feel about you. I’m not treating you badly, I’m just looking out for you._

Trying to ignore the pain in her ribs, Erin turned back to the whiteboard. _It had just been one time_ , she tried to remind herself. _He said he was sorry, things will get better. I just have to be better, and things can go back like they were before_.

As the redhead tried to focus on her equations again, she was unaware of Holtzmann watching her, completely missing the pain in the engineer’s eyes as a result. But just because Erin didn’t know about it, didn’t mean it wasn’t happening. So as Erin worked, Holtzmann just sat there, the feeling that she had failed one of the few friends she had – and of course that had to be the one woman who meant so much more to her than just a friend, because why the fuck not make this situation even worse – weighing heavy on her heart.


	12. Chapter 12

Every time Holtzmann had been convinced the situation couldn’t get any worse, it seemed like the universe was eager to prove her wrong. A few days after she unsuccessfully had tried to talk to Erin, the redhead came in that morning to tell them that she would move in with Phil the coming weekend, and presented a little piece of paper on which she had noted down her new address.

“Aw honey, that’s great”, Patty smiled, and Holtzmann just wanted to scream at her at that point. Was she actually so blind? Couldn’t she see how miserable Erin was? How she could say that this was a great thing when Erin was so obviously unhappy with everything about this man?

“A bit fast though”, she said, smiling at Erin instead of yelling these things into Patty’s face, “And it means something when The Holtzmann says that. I mean, I basically have a U-Haul loyalty card.”

The joke fell so flat she could almost hear it, Patty just rolling her eyes while Erin just gave her a confused look. Holtzmann cleared her throat, then scratched the back of her head, feeling quite awkward all at once.

“Um”, she said, “cause, you know, that was a gay joke? Cause of that cliché that lesbians move in together incredibly fast?”

“Oh”, Erin replied, then let out the fake laughter Holtzmann had heard from her before. She grimaced, but didn’t comment on it, and had to hold back the urge to yell at Patty once more when the historian suggested that they could help Erin move.

“Oh no that’s okay, thank you”, Erin replied, smiling at her, even though the smile yet again didn’t reach her eyes, “Phil already took care of that.”

_Of course he did,_ Holtzmann thought to herself, keeping her face carefully neutral, _won’t do if he slips up in front of your friends and they notice what he is doing to you, right? But I noticed anyway, and I know._

She wanted to say these things out loud, but kept them to herself, knowing it wouldn’t lead anywhere if she spoke up. Instead, she just kept observing, watching how Erin got more and more fidgety as the weekend drew closer.

As if to drive the point home that Erin moving in with this man was a bad idea, Erin brought her MIT hoodie to work with her that Friday. It was pressed and neatly folded, and the engineer had to use every bit of energy she had to hide how her heart broke as she accepted it. Even then, she barely listened to Erin explaining how she had washed it and that she had kept it for way too long now, anyway, and that Holtzmann should really take it back.

_It’s like the necklace, isn’t it,_ she thought to herself while she told Erin that she could borrow it again anytime, _you don’t want him to find it and throw it out or ruin it or whatever he does with things you own and he doesn’t like. How much of your stuff do you think he’s going to throw out when you move in with him? What else do you actually want to save?_

Again, she said none of those things aloud, but simply put the hoodie into her locker, adding a line about it in her notebook.

Once the weekend had passed and Erin came in on Monday morning, the first thing Holtzmann noticed was how pale she was. She looked like she had barely slept at all, and for the millionth time the engineer asked herself how it could be that she was the only one who noticed these things.

There were more changes after Erin had moved in with the man, more things for Holtzmann to note down in her notebook. Other than Erin now looking at her phone multiple times an hour – something she had never done before – she started to avoid going on busts in the afternoon. First it were just the late ones, Erin making excuses about how she had to be punctual and Phil didn’t like slime in his apartment. “And you know that stuff is always after me.” She laughed, and it was that horrible fake laugh again, and Holtzmann just wanted to punch something.

Then it was after-lunch busts in general. Only on certain days at first, then completely, with Erin only going with them when they happened before lunch. When Abby questioned her about it, Erin always gave the same vague answer, as if she didn’t want to lie to them but couldn’t tell them the truth.

Holtzmann could see Erin’s evasiveness was getting to Abby (#13 on the list), and the blonde wanted to speak up now more than ever. But with the way Patty had dismissed her at the time, she doubted Abby would believe her. And if Holtzmann told them too soon, without having enough data to back up her claim, she knew she could ruin any chance she had at them believing her.

What she did realize, however, was that moving in with Phil apparently had killed whatever little spark Erin might have had left. It was then that she started keeping a tally of the number of times Erin smiled a day – _genuinely smiled_ – only to nearly end up crying when she realized that number was in single digits already.

She had been afraid before, and worried for Erin, but when she realized that the physicist practically had stopped smiling, all of these emotions reached new, unknown heights. She decided then and there to do everything in her power to make Erin smile again, to get that number up again, and she spent the next few days employing every single tactic she could think of. From cheesy one-liner jokes to a whole barrage of dance moves – and that was another thing, she hadn’t seen Erin dance in _forever_ , and she never thought she’d miss those stupid finger-gun moves as much as she did – Holtzmann tried it all. She even delivered Erin one of those chocolate chip frappucchinos she claimed to hate, but still always drank whenever she had an especially bad day.

It only partially worked. The gift did get her a smile from Erin, but as Holtzmann had partially suspected already, the drink remained untouched. By the end of the day, when Erin left the firehouse ( _to go to him_ , her mind unhelpfully supplied), there was just a molten chocolate mess in a plastic cup.

As she tossed it in the bin, she added ‘doesn’t even respond to comfort food anymore’ to the still-growing list.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Special Thanks to Ectoholtzmann, who had the brilliant MIT hoodie idea :D


	13. Chapter 13

Erin had told herself that it was a good idea to move in with Phil, that it would be good for their relationship. She hadn’t been nearly as happy lately as when they had started this relationship again, but maybe that was just because of the distance there still was between them, the lack of commitment. At least, that’s what he had told her, telling her how he had no idea how he was supposed to trust her if she wasn’t coming home to him every night. “For all I know you’re out with some other guy. Please, Erin, it would put me at ease to know that my bed is the only one you’re sleeping in at night.”

When Erin had tried to argue that of _course_ she wouldn’t cheat on him, she _loved_ him, he had actually apologized for doubting her, pulling her in his arms and placing a soft kiss on top of her head. “You’re right, sweetheart.” He’d told her, Erin melting into his embrace. “I’m sorry. Of course you’re not cheating on me. After all; who else could possibly want you?”

His words barely even registered as an insult anymore, Erin just taking the apology with a smile as she hugged him back, glad their little argument had been resolved and thinking how lucky she was to have him. It hadn’t stopped him from continuing to push Erin to move in with him, and after a week the physicist had agreed. After all, she had begun spending most of her nights at his apartment anyway. For all intents and purposes, she didn’t even have her own apartment anymore; actually moving in with him would just make that official.

(Still, something had nagged at her when she told him she would move in with him, even as he smiled and kissed her. She felt a strange sense of loss at the knowledge she’d have to clear out her own apartment, a place she had begun to think of as a safe haven. She didn’t want to think about what that feeling meant).

So she had moved in with him, bringing only the barest essentials after Phil had promised his place already had everything else. “You don’t need much more than this, Erin. Anything else I can just get for you later.” It would be good for them, she tried to tell herself. They would spend more time together, and maybe he would pick up on how unhappy she was slowly beginning to feel. He would notice, and tell her he loved her, and things could go back to being like before.

She thought moving in with him could only make things better for both of them.

She was wrong.

“You know, I still don’t see why you want to go this stupid gala”, Phil grumbled one Friday evening, about a month after Erin had moved in with him, tugging at his tie. “Can’t your colleagues do that without you? It was hard enough to get reservations at the restaurant as it is, they were quite unhappy when we had to bump those back.”

“The mayor invited us personally”, Erin mumbled, keeping her back to him as she chose a dress from her wardrobe, “It’s kind of important. I… I told you, I have to go. It’s disrespectful not to… And we might lose our funding if I don’t… And we don’t have to stay long…”

She realized that was rambling and forced herself to shut up. Her boyfriend didn’t like it when she talked back to him on the best of days, and even less when she ranted on and on. She didn’t want to risk his anger right now; not when she had this function to attend.

“Fine”, Phil sighed, pretty much having tuned her out immediately. “If it means that much to you, we’ll go. But you owe me for this, Erin.” That caused Erin to smile at him, grateful for his understanding. _See_? She tried to tell herself. _He isn’t all bad. You just have to be better, it will all be okay._

“Thank you, Phil.”

He just waved it off, clearly annoyed by his girlfriend. “Just get ready. The sooner you’re done, the sooner we can get this over with.”

Erin glanced at him and gave him another brief smile, then retreated to the bathroom to put on her dress and do her make-up. As she pulled off her shirt, she tried to avoid looking at herself in the bathroom mirror, not wanting to see the bruises again. He had apologized, of course. He always did. He said he was sorry, that he had just lost his temper. That he was drunk, that Erin had goaded him into it by being so stupid. That even Erin’s idiocy angering him shouldn’t have been an excuse to act like this. That they both had to work at this, so this wouldn’t happen again.

(It always happened again)

But no amount of apologies made the ugly, blue and purple marks fade any faster. And it didn’t make them hurt any less, either, both physically and mentally. To Erin, they were painful and stark reminders of her own mistakes, of how she had kept ruining a perfectly good relationship by saying and doing all the wrong things. The less she saw of them, the better.

She managed to avoid looking as she pulled on the dress, making sure afterwards that it all was covered up. Once she had convinced herself that no bruising could be seen anywhere, she quickly did her make-up and brushed her hair, forcing a smile onto her face as she joined him in the bedroom again, nodding when he impatiently asked if she was ready.

“Are you sure?”, he stated, sounding impatient and annoyed already, giving her a once-over with a sceptical look. “Because that looks more like a dress to wear when you are trying to pick up a man on a street corner, not like a dress to wear to a professional gala.”

“I thought you might like it”, Erin mumbled, her gaze dropping down to the carpet as she cursed herself. He was right; the dress _was_ a bit more daring than what she usually wore, but until this moment, she hadn’t thought it’d made her look cheap. She had honestly assumed her boyfriend would be pleased with her, dressing up for him, but maybe it was a little over the top.

“Oh, I do”, Phil gave back with a grin, which made Erin feel a little better, “but so will every other guy there.”

And there was the self-loathing again. Because no, she hadn’t thought of that, and she now realized that she probably should have. She was about to explain as much to Phil, when he shook his head. “Or, you know what: nevermind, Sweetheart. It’s not like anyone else would want you the way I do.”

Gently – and undoubtedly condescendingly – patting Erin’s arm, he walked past her, grabbing his jacket as he headed towards the door. Erin quickly followed him, not even blinking at the comment as they left the apartment together. He had told her similar things before, after all, peppered with small, well-veiled barbs about how no one else would ever want to live with her and be the way he wanted to be with her anyway. By now, she just took the little verbal jabs for granted, believing them with all her heart after months of practically constant reassurances from him that he was the only one who cared, and that no one else would bother if it wasn’t for him.

_He is right, you know_? The little voice in Erin’s head said, drowning out whatever little self-worth she still had left. _You should feel lucky to have him. He even moved his reservations just so he could be with you for this. Even if you found someone else, would they really be as caring as him?_

During the cab ride, Erin noted Phil still didn’t look all too happy, but he put on a more or less convincing smile when he parked at the venue where the formal gala honouring the Ghostbusters and their accomplishments would be held. His arm was around Erin’s waist as they walked up the steps to the entrance where the others were already waiting for them.

Erin noted that Holtzmann smiled at her – and just at her, for some reason – when they approached, their arrival interrupting a conversation with Jennifer Lynch.

“Dr Gilbert”, Jennifer greeted her, smiling, “how nice that you could make it.”

Erin made herself smile, and nod, a motion she repeated when Abby asked if they could go inside then, now that they were all here. She let Phil hand over the invitation, neither of them noticing that Holtzmann was watching him do so with a frown, a frown which deepened when he claimed that it was “Dr Phil Hudson plus one.”

_It’s Dr Erin Gilbert plus one, douchecanoe_ , Holtzmann thought to herself, but said nothing; she handed her invitation over silently, then followed the couple inside, taking note of how Phil had his arm around Erin’s waist the whole time. Somehow, he managed to make it look not tender, but possessive, and that only angered the blonde further. She tried not to let it show, though; this was a night for celebration. If anything, she hoped being honoured for their accomplishments would help cheer Erin up, even just a little.

Her heart sank, however, when she saw Phil immediately steered Erin towards the bar, instead of to the table reserved for them. The engineer wasn’t stupid; she knew he’d keep her away from them as much as possible, but she had at least hoped he’d give Erin at least a few minutes with her friends.

She felt even worse when she realized Abby appeared to have noticed the same thing, except in a different context.

“You know, I’m surprised she’s even here at all. She’s skipped out on so much lately, she’s barely even part of the team anymore.”

Holtzmann saw Erin stiffen up ahead, and knew she had heard, and for a moment, the urge to turn around and yell at Abby – or maybe punch her – was so strong she could barely withstand it. But her anger soon made way for fear and worry, as Erin seemed to shrink as Phil said something about getting a drink to her. As she saw Phil steer her further away, Holtzmann wondered what he was saying to her. Undoubtedly it was about them, and their attitude towards Erin, and now more than ever Holtzmann wanted to just run over and give Phil a piece of her mind. Gala or not, she didn’t want Erin to think for a _second_ that they didn’t care about her. She suppressed the urge, however, knowing that if she wasn’t believed by anyone, she would only be making the situation worse for Erin.

Still, she couldn’t bring herself to listen to the others speak, instead watching Erin and Phil. He kept her away from their table as long as he could without letting anyone else suspect anything – and clearly, he had no idea that Holtzmann knew something was up at this point – and when the two finally did join the rest of the team, the first thing he said was that they had to go soon.

“I got us reservations at Petrossian”, he let the group know, with an air of smugness, “not easy to get a table there. Good thing I could bump that to a later time, right, babe?”

“Yes, good thing”, Erin agreed at once, while the way he’d said _babe_ made Holtzmann’s skin crawl. Much like the way he always held on to Erin, it sounded creepy and possessive rather than sweet. But that was nothing compared to the way Erin’s response to him made her feel. “Isn’t he wonderful? I’m so lucky to have him.”

Holtzmann wanted to throw up at how automated this response came – as if he’d trained it into her, the way someone might train their dog to play dead or shake hands. She had made the comparison to Phil treating Erin like his pet before, but it had only gotten more obvious over the months. Yet again she wondered how no one else seemed to notice this. At this point, she just wanted to shake Abby and Patty, _beg_ them to wake up and open their damn eyes.

Instead, her saviour seemed to come in the form of one Jennifer Lynch, who had joined them just in time to hear that comment.

“And we are lucky to have Erin on our team”, She threw in, smiling at Erin as she did, and Holtzmann made a mental note to thank the PA by maybe breaking one less rule next time. Whether Jennifer knew it or not, this was exactly the sort of thing Erin needed to hear right now. “She’s doing very important work for the Ghostbusters.”

If she weren’t so head over heels in love with the physicist, the engineer might have kissed Jennifer for that. And when she saw Erin smiling back at Jennifer, she could see the tiniest bit of pride there. The smile was still mostly fake – and she wondered if Jennifer noticed that – but Holtzmann could see just a tiniest bit of the old Erin in there, and it made her heart sing. If they could just keep this up, maybe they could undo some of the things Phil had done to her self-esteem.

_Speaking of the walking sewage,_ Holtzmann thought, it seemed he had other plans, all but immediately turning the conversation back to himself.

“Certainly”, Phil replied, missing the glare Holtzmann shot him for his dismissive tone, while Erin’s smile faded as the redhead focused on her glass again. “But, did you know I just had an article published in Nature?”

“It was very good”, Erin supplied dutifully, not saying a word about her own accomplishments, never mind that ‘I helped save New York City’ certainly weighed heavier than ‘I got published in a magazine’, “I read it before it got published, he did very good work.”

He gave them all a smug smile that made Holtzmann want to punch him, then downed the rest of his drink and told Erin to come with him so they could get new ones, clearly not caring much that hers wasn’t even half empty yet. Holtzmann noted that just for a moment there, the physicist looked nervous at the idea of him drinking more. But as the blonde had expected, Erin didn’t complain. She just nodded, and letting it happen that he put his arm around her waist again and practically led her off.

Holtzmann watched them go, holding back a sigh; and when shortly after Phil had downed the fresh drink, they let them know that they would head out to their dinner now, she couldn’t even say anymore that she was surprised, the pang in her heart at their time together being cut short painfully familiar by now.

* * *

 

It had taken her a while, but finally, Jennifer had managed to get away from the mayor and his endless needs and had managed to sneak outside for a quick cigarette. She sent a quick prayer to whoever might be listening that she’d have the chance to finish her smoke in peace, leaning comfortably against the wall as she took the first drag, closing her eyes at the nicotine hitting her system.

_Oh yes, that’s the stuff._

She knew that smoking was bad for her, but it was a stress reliever as well. And with a job like hers, she was going to take every way to relax she could get.

She took another deep drag, watching the cars drive by and letting her thoughts wander away from all the bullshit she had to put up with on a daily basis. She hoped to god it would all be worth it someday. Jennifer Lynch had every intention of running for office someday in the near future, and to her, that day couldn’t come soon enough.

Just when she started to relax, the door to the venue opened, and she found herself watching how Erin and Phil exited the building, a frown creasing her brow at the way the man – whom she found quite unsympathetic – was holding the smaller woman’s arm.

“…could have said something on your own, you know”, he was saying, neither of them noticing her, “instead of taking all that praise and making me look like a fool. That was embarrassing.”

Jennifer’s frown deepened at that, and even further at how Erin immediately and in a small voice replied “I’m sorry, Phil.” He manhandled her down the stairs in response, and Jennifer forgot all about her smoke and her relaxation when she took note of the physicist stumbling thanks to the speed with which he dragged her along, and she held back a wince as she saw Erin twist her ankle.

She saw it from where she stood, and certainly her boyfriend had seen it, too, but he didn’t seem to care the slightest, only dragging her along further to where the cabs were waiting.

“You better be sorry”, he said, and Jennifer’s confusion was soon making way for horror. “I’ll make you pay for that once we get home. Treating me like this in public.”

Jennifer had expected many responses to this from Erin, ranging from disbelief to anger; what she _hadn’t_ expected was a simple nod from the physicist, and a brief, but clearly frightened glance at the man, before she got into the cab with him. As she watched the car speed off, Jennifer stared in disbelief, trying to wrap her head around what she had seen.

She knew Erin, unfortunately enough. She knew the woman had a certain fire inside her, a certain stubbornness that could risk letting the cat out the bag. There was a desperate need for validation there, and if Jennifer was entirely honest – after at least 9 shots of bourbon, and a blood-oath to the other party swearing them to secrecy – she could see something of herself in the other woman. And if anyone had treated Erin like that when she had first met the woman, the physicist would have broken their nose without a second thought.

(She had the proof of that still, in the form of a New York Post article).

But what she had seen just now was _nothing_ like the Erin she knew. And thinking back on how the other woman had acted during the dinner, Jennifer was beginning to wonder more and more if this was just a one time thing.

Even as the rest of the evening dragged on, Jennifer couldn’t put that scene out of her mind, the way the man had spoken of ‘punishment’ – and more so, Erin’s reaction to it. Was this normal? Was this just a one-time thing? Or was this ingrained deeper than that, and was _that_ why Erin still stayed.

_Certainly the other three were aware of this,_ she pondered as she looked through the mayor’s schedule and was dismayed to find that the next meeting with the group would be only two weeks later. _This was definitely too long,_ she decided. Jennifer had some experience with domestic abuse victims, and she knew that in all cases, time was of the essence. The brunette wanted clarity on this as soon as possible, and she made a mental note to call them first thing Monday morning and reschedule to an earlier date.

* * *

 

And so it happened that Jennifer Lynch and all 4 Ghostbusters were in the mayor’s office on Tuesday after the gala instead of just twelve days later. For a change, however, Jennifer wasn’t the one leading the conversation. She let the mayor do most of the talking, while the PA employed a rather scientific approach, and simply observed.

The first thing she noticed was how quiet Dr Gilbert was. She’d been fiddling with her phone when she had entered, and now only moved on her chair to touch the pocket she’d put it in, sitting oddly stiff the rest of the time, barely saying more than two sentences the whole meeting.

That alone would have been disconcerting, but there was also the fact that Dr Holtzmann kept looking at the physicist, with clear worry. _She knew, then_ , Jennifer noted, because there was no other reason for Dr Holtzmann to look at Erin this way. Sure, Jennifer knew the blonde had a massive crush on Erin – a crush the physicist herself was hopelessly oblivious to, which was why the engineer could get away with staring at her so often – but this was nothing like that. Rather than with love, Holtzmann was just looking at her with pain and worry in her eyes, like she was afraid something would happen to Erin right there and then.

Dr Yates, on the other hand, mostly ignored her alleged best friend, and when she did look at her, it was a mix of anger and bitterness. This also struck Jennifer as odd, and she wondered if that was just her reaction to finding out about Erin’s situation. But when she recalled the comments made by the scientist the day before, she felt her heart sink a little. And when even Miss Tolan behaved no differently than she normally would, Jennifer jumped to a painful conclusion as supported by her observations.

_They had absolutely no idea_. And if they kept this up, Dr Erin Gilbert would pretty soon be out of the Ghostbusters picture. From an administrative perspective, this should have delighted Jennifer, but all she could feel was sick with worry. Because no one, _no one_ deserved to go through this. She wouldn’t wish this on her worst enemy, and for someone whose idea of a screensaver was a video of mass hysteria, that was saying something.

“Dr Holtzmann”, she said, making the blonde pause in mid-movement after the mayor had wrapped up his meeting, “a word in private?”

The engineer looked somewhat surprised, but nodded. Jennifer noticed her cast another worried look at Erin as the physicist walked outside with the rest, and the moment the door had closed behind the group and Jennifer was alone with the engineer, she spoke up, not bothering to beat around the bush.

“I can hardly believe I’m saying this”, she started, Dr Holtzmann eyeing her warily, clearly not knowing what to expect, “but… do they seriously not know?”

“Not know what?” the blonde gave back, sounding honestly confused. Jennifer simply raised an eyebrow, and gave her a pointed look, and she could practically hear how the pieces clicked together in the engineer’s mind.

When Holtzmann then shook her head, Jennifer could barely believe it.

For a moment, she felt uncharacteristically lost – she was good at organizing, and at her job, but not so much at such interactions – then she reached out and awkwardly touched the engineer’s shoulder, and she’d be damned if Holtzmann’s face didn’t work for a few seconds there, as if she had to hold back tears.

“If there’s anything I can do”, the brunette said, simultaneously wondering if she ever had seen the engineer like this and how no one else but the two of them could have noticed what was happening to Erin, how uncharacteristically quiet she had been during the meeting, the fire Jennifer had liked about her from day one appearing to be completely gone, “call me, alright?”

She pulled her hand back to write down her private cell number, and handed the card to Holtzmann afterwards. For her, this was it, but apparently, Holtzmann had other ideas, suddenly and unexpectedly stepping forward and hugging the surprised woman tightly.

It took Jennifer a moment to hug her back, completely taken aback at first, but once her initial surprise had worn off, she brought up her arms and somewhat awkwardly patted the engineer’s back. She felt her shudder in the embrace and found herself wondering how long Holtzmann had been dealing with this alone, and how long this had been going on in general.

_How had no one put a stop to this yet?_

She almost expected the blonde to start crying any moment, but when the engineer did pull back from the hug another moment later, her eyes were dry and her face surprisingly calm.

“Thank you”, was all she said, and all Jennifer could do was nod. Holtzmann gave her a strangely sad smile, one which looked so wrong on her face that it almost hurt the brunette physically, then turned and walked off without another word, following the rest of her team outside, Jennifer looking after her with an odd weight constricting her chest, suddenly filled by the terrifying foreboding that things would get worse before they’d get better.


	14. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In case the previous chapters or the warnings tags of the fic itself had not been enough; this chapter contains physical descriptions of domestic abuse.

It was a few nights later that things took a turn for the worst for Erin.

Or, worse than they already were.

In hindsight, she supposed she should have seen this coming. She should have known this would only be a matter of time. But she’d always had faith, always believed that things would be okay, that she couldn’t possibly mess this thing up any more.

However, she hadn’t counted on her subconscious betraying her.

It was the anniversary of the haunting of Mrs. DeMille, and for Erin, that meant nightmares. Every year, without fail, she’d re-live that first night in her dreams, again a terrified little girl of 8 years old, all alone with no one to believe her. And every year, without fail, the ghost would remind her of that, remind her of how she was crazy, how she would always be alone, how no one would ever want to be her friend. It were all the worst aspects of her childhood wrapped into one big distorted nightmare, and Erin hated it.

This year, however, things were different. Her mind had been so caught up with trying to keep her relationship together that she hadn’t even seen the anniversary approaching, and so the nightmare took her by surprise. Had it been so long already? She hadn’t even realized how her days had begun to blur together, the constant anxiety slowly getting the better of her.

But shortly after she went to sleep that night, she found herself waking up to an all-too-familiar vision. Standing at the end of the bed she shared with Phil was the ghost that had caused her so many problems as a child. Gretta DeMille was dressed as she always was, pointing at Erin with an accusing finger, the stench of burning garbage already making Erin choke and gag.

She tried to tell her to go away, to leave her alone, but like always, no words would form. Instead, Gretta spoke, telling Erin most of the same things she told her every year. How no one would ever love her. How she would end up alone. How she was crazy, how no one would ever believe her if she tried to convince them otherwise. How none of her accomplishments would ever matter, because no one was going to care, and nothing was going to cover up the fact that she was just this sad and lonely Ghost Girl.

Except this time, Gretta said all of this in Phil’s voice.

Erin woke up screaming when the ghost vomited blood all over her, on the verge of a panic attack as she tried to get rid of the invisible slime. _Disgusting, Phil thinks it’s disgusting, I’m disgusting, this has to go_ …

She was completely unaware of Phil next to her, who had been woken up by Erin’s screams. All she wanted to do now was make sure she was alright, that the ghost was gone, that she didn’t just get their bed covered in ectoplasm. Her heart was racing in her chest, her brow was glistening with sweat, and she was hyperventilating as she tried to wipe away at non-existent stains. _Disgusting, unlovable, disgusting…_

“Erin, what the Hell?!”

Erin felt herself calm down just the tiniest bit as she recognized the voice. _Phil_. Phil would make it okay, he would understand, he would know it wasn’t her fault. He loved her, he told her so himself. He loved her and he would believe her if she told him about the ghost. That’s what people who loved you did. They believed you, no matter how crazy you might sound.

 _Did they, though?_ A small voice asked her. _Because your parents loved you, and they sent you to therapy for it_.

She supposed that’s why it didn’t come as much of a surprise when Phil continued to yell at her, his angry voice cutting through her like a knife.

“God, it’s like three a.m.,”, Phil raged at her, clearly not caring that he was loud enough to wake their neighbours at this time, sitting up and glaring at her, “I have work tomorrow! What were you thinking, dumb bitch!”

He lashed out without thinking or aim, and she bit back a cry when the back of his hand connected. It wasn’t the first time he’d hit her, after all, and she knew by now that it’d only get worse if she’d let him see how much it hurt and how humiliating it was.

“I’m sorry”, she brought out, her voice still trembling with fear. Not that he seemed to notice. At this point, Erin knew he was too mad to notice much of anything. He didn’t even apologize anymore; not immediately, at least. She knew he’d probably do so in the morning, but for now, all she could hope for was the situation not escalating any more.

It seemed she was in luck this time, though, with Phil just glaring at her as he laid back down.

“I should kick you out to the living room for that”, he grumbled, turning so his back was to her, “but just this once, I’ll let that slide. Go back to sleep, I have important work to do tomorrow.”

She let out an agreeing noise in response, and apparently, that was enough for him, since he was snoring again a short while later. Erin was still trembling all the while, trying to get her heartrate under control and dully wondering if it was possible to die of fear, and why the prospect actually seemed appealing to her.

She didn’t sleep another wink that night, her mind plagued with worries and fears brought forth by the nightmare and Phil’s actions. Her neck was throbbing where he had hit her, and she wondered if it’d bruise in a spot where her clothes wouldn’t hide it. She asked herself why the only person who’d love her had to be like this sometimes, and tried her best to keep quiet as she cried, knowing she’d only make the situation worse if she woke him up again. She spent the rest of the night sitting up against the headboard, silent tears streaming down her face as she waited for the alarm to go off.

When it did, and Erin had a chance to get dressed for the day, the first thing she realized was that he _had_ struck her at a point this time where her clothing wouldn’t hide the bruising; not all of it, at least. His blind hit had landed close to where her neck met her shoulder, and had been hard enough to have the bruise spread up to her throat.

At least it could still be covered up with a scarf, she supposed. It was an odd look for a late New York summer, and she hoped to god the temperatures would be kind to her, but it was better than nothing. And if anyone asked, she could just claim she was feeling a little under the weather; summer cases of the flu weren’t as uncommon as one might think.

She also applied some make-up to hide the dark rings beneath her eyes, as she did every morning, trying everything in her power not to arouse any suspicion from her co-workers and friends. She had seen Holtzmann looking at her strangely these past weeks, and had noticed the engineer had been oddly nice to her. She suspected she knew _something_ was wrong, but Erin didn’t want to give her any more reason to be suspicious of her.

(She didn’t question once _why_ she didn’t want anybody to notice. And the thought that if someone noticed they would actually try to help her, or that this was something she needed help with because it wasn’t normal, never even entered her mind.)

During the subway ride to the firehouse, Erin stared aimlessly out of the window, even though all she could see was tunnel walls. She hoped that the bruising wouldn’t make her sound weird as she got out at her stop, deciding that she wouldn’t talk much that day. Not that she had been big on talking lately, but apparently nobody had noticed that either. She also hoped she didn’t look as tired as she felt when she reached their headquarters and entered, praying the make-up would be enough to keep any suspicion at bay.

“Good morning”, she greeted the others, knowing that she at least had to say that. To her ears, her voice sounded mostly normal, and nobody seemed to react oddly to her in any way, Abby just giving her a brief glance – that was all the researcher seemed to do lately, they hardly ever spoke anymore when it wasn’t about work. Holtzmann seemed busy staring into her coffee, something she appeared to do a lot lately in the mornings, and Patty let out an amused noise, grinning as she nodded at the scarf around her neck.

“Lookin’ tired and wearin’ a scarf, huh”, she then said, with a bit of a teasing tone, “had a long night, babygirl?”

Before Erin had a chance to reply to that, feeling oddly surreal that Patty would think _that,_ of all things, Holtzmann’s eyes came up from her coffee to meet hers. And in that moment, it was painfully clear to Erin that Holtzmann did _not_ think that she’d had a good night. The shock and horror were clear in her gaze, and for a moment Erin almost expected her to faint, judging from how pale her face got.

If she had still had any doubts about Holtzmann’s suspicions, that look dispelled them all, and her heart plummeted all the way to her stomach.

Holtzmann knew. Holtzmann _knew_ , and suddenly Erin was so ashamed that she couldn’t look her in the eye anymore, knowing she wouldn’t be able to stand the pity there, and the contempt, for letting herself get into this kind of situation.

“…yeah”, she made herself answer Patty’s question, moving quickly to get herself coffee, and studiously avoiding it to look at Holtzmann the whole time, “good night. A lot of fun.”

“Way to go, girl”, Patty laughed, while Abby seemed less amused. Erin forced herself to smile at the historian, and tried to hide how much her hands shook as she took hold of her coffee cup and excused herself to her desk.

For a while, she just stood in front of her whiteboard, staring at the numbers and equations that seemed to blur together. None of her work seemed to make any sense to her, not the way they usually did, and she had to blink her eyes hard every now and then, when tears threatened to blurry her vision.

After a while, she gave up on the equations, even though she knew Holtzmann needed them for her work – _and Holtzmann would be so disappointed_ , she thought to herself, _when she’d be stuck in her work because of Erin’s failure, disappointed and angry_ – and sat down at her desk, staring at one of her books there, not really seeing the printed words and numbers.

Phil had hit her. Erin had to wear a scarf in summer just to hide that fact. And Holtzmann knew. Jillian Holtzmann knew what situation Erin had gotten herself into, and she either hated her, pitied her, or both. And now she couldn’t even finish her work for the blonde. She felt well and truly awful, and not for the first time she wondered if anyone in the firehouse even still wanted her around. What good was she to them? A little weakling who couldn’t stand up for herself, who couldn’t keep her relationship together, and whose only redeeming quality was work she no longer seemed to be able to do.

_Wouldn’t it be better for everyone if she just left?_

“Erin?”

She jumped at Holtzmann saying her name, the kind and soft tone ripping her from her thoughts before she looked up at her, not even having noticed her approach. Holtzmann smiled at her, and Erin was sure she saw pity in that smile, and a bit of disbelief, the unasked question “how did you get into this mess and why are you too weak to get out?” clear in her gaze. At least to Erin.

“We’re ordering lunch”, the engineer went on, her gaze briefly flickering to the scarf, then back up to her face, “want something? We can share those noodles you like so much.”

“No thanks”, Erin made herself say, giving her best to sound normal and as if she hadn’t been on the verge of tears constantly since getting up this morning, not wanting more pity from her friend, “I’m… not really hungry.”

Holtzmann stared at her curiously, but while Erin felt herself shrink away under the assumed scrutiny, the engineer’s mind was going completely different places than the physicist herself assumed.

_What happened, Erin? Did he hit you? Or even choke you? Did he choke you? Tell me if he did Erin. Tell me what happened, let me in. Let me help. I swear to God I’ll kill him if he did this to you. I’ll kill him and rip his rotten little heart out._

“Okay”, Holtzmann said instead of saying out loud what went through her mind, “if you change your mind, tell me, I’ll share with you, alright?”

“I have to go the bathroom”, Erin brought out in response, Holtzmann looking a bit startled at this answer, but nodding nonetheless. The physicist almost shot up from her chair and walked to the bathroom as fast as she could, locking the door behind herself, then just slumped back against the wood and slid down to the floor, burying her face in her hands.

A shudder ran through her as she started to cry, not a sound coming over her lips though. She didn’t know if anyone was close enough to the door to hear her sobbing, but she didn’t want to risk it, not quite realizing that the skill to cry so quietly had been one she had acquired in the past six months. She just needed some time to herself, some time to think, to sort out her thoughts and figure out what she was going to tell Holtzmann. It wouldn’t be long before the blonde told the other Ghostbusters about Erin’s failure, and she _needed_ to come up with a good excuse before then.

She didn’t know how long she had been sitting on the cold tiled floor, but apparently, it had been a while, because the other three were eating by the time she had made sure no traces of her tears showed and came out of the bathroom again. Holtzmann was looking at her with that look in her eyes again, that one Erin was sure was pity, but didn’t say anything, and since she hadn’t ordered any food with the others, she moved back to her desk, to stare at her book some more.

Again, Erin didn’t register the passage of time as she just sat there, feeling oddly numb. When Abby called out her name, she jumped again, and looked up, the researcher holding up a piece of paper as she told her that they had been called to another bust.

“You gonna come?” she asked, and there was a certain tone in her voice which made Erin’s stomach clench, “or you gonna sit this one out, too?”

Erin glanced at the clock; she couldn’t go if it was too late in the afternoon, Phil would throw a fit if she came to his apartment slimed again. Or if she came home late, for that matter. He’d accuse her of somehow cheating on him, of making him worry, of being inconsiderate to his feelings. Erin didn’t want to make Phil feel bad on the best days, but after last night she was even more worried of doing anything else to make him feel bad. She had already interrupted his sleep; she couldn’t hurt him any more if she didn’t want him to leave her.

Abby noticed where she had looked and threw up her hands, angry now, her tone nearly bringing fresh tears to the redhead’s eyes.

“Okay, you know what, never mind”, Abby said sharply, “you haven’t been on a bust with us in weeks, so why would I think you’d go with us now? Why are you even still here, Erin?”

“Abby”, Holtzmann started, somewhere behind Abby, but Erin couldn’t look at her, unable to look away from Abby, from the anger on her best friend’s face. She wanted to explain, wanted to tell Abby _why_ she couldn’t risk it, but Abby shook her head, stabbing her finger in the general direction where Holtzmann probably was, impossibly sounding even angrier when she continued.

“No, Holtzmann, no”, she said, addressing the engineer, but not looking away from Erin, “this is it. Why are you even still here, Erin? Do you think we haven’t noticed? How distracted you are all the time? How unhappy you are? Do you think we’re blind?”

 _Abby knows, too,_ Erin thought to herself, swallowing heavily, _Abby knows, and Patty probably knows too. But Abby is angry, she’s not pitying me, she’ll help, just tell her, tell her, tell her what he is…_

“Save us and yourself the trouble and stop wasting everyone’s time!”, Abby went on, and the last few things which made sense in Erin’s world crumbled beneath her feet. “We all know you want to leave, so just go already!”

“Abby!” Holtzmann sounded shocked, and even Patty let out an audible gasp, but Erin didn’t hear any of it. Her ears were ringing with Abby’s last words to her, as she watched her last bit of familiarity and sense of home crumble before her eyes.

 _You should have seen this coming_ , a voice in her head taunted her. _Phil has been telling you as much for months now. He knew they didn’t care about you. He knew no one there wanted you around, but you didn’t listen. Stupid little Erin, stupid little Ghost Girl, actually thinking she had friends. Actually thinking people would care about her. You have Phil now, and that is all you’re ever going to get. No one else is going to love you. Everyone else wants you to go. Why didn’t you leave sooner? You could have saved them the trouble of firing you._

For a few seconds, Erin just sat there, letting the poisonous thoughts take over every last corner of her mind, before she slowly got up from her seat. Grabbing her bag, she slowly headed towards the door, not saying another word. She knew that if she even as much as looked back, if she even so much as spoke, she would end up crying again. And if she cried, they would either mock her for it, or pity her, and the last thing Erin wanted was their pity. She got enough reminders of how pathetic she was already; she didn’t need the people who she had once upon a time thought of as her friends – _stupid, Erin, to think you could ever have friends_ – to add to that.

“Erin!” she heard Holtzmann behind her, the blonde catching up with her just as she reached the door. “Erin, no, don’t- Don’t go. We can fix this! I swear we can, just please… please don’t go.”

The engineer sounded oddly desperate, and for a split second Erin dared to believe that someone else might actually want her around. After all, Holtzmann knew, and Holtzmann had been nice to her despite all that. But then she remembered that most likely, that kindness had just been born out of pity. Pity for the pathetic woman who couldn’t even keep herself from hurting her boyfriend, causing him to do things that he normally would never do. And she didn’t deserve to burden Holtzmann any more than she already had, which meant she had to go.

“It’s fine, Holtzmann”, she made herself say, the hollow and empty look in her eyes when she looked at the blonde breaking the engineer’s heart once more. “this is probably the best for all of us.”

Holtzmann could see nothing but resignation in those green eyes, and she wanted nothing more than to take Erin in her arms. To hug her, to hold her, to tell her it was all going to be okay and to just keep her from going back to that… that _hellhole_ that Erin had been forced to call ‘home’.

“Erin”, Holtzmann started again, sounding as if she was close to tears now. Erin just shook her head, then stepped out the door and gently closed it behind herself. And when she heard the latch click, the tears did come, and so she lowered her head as she walked away from the firehouse, suddenly all too sure that was the last time she’d set foot in there.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're sorry except for the part where we're not.


	15. Chapter 15

_Erin should have slammed the door_ , Holtzmann thought to herself as she stood staring at the smooth wood, trying to keep herself from putting her fist right through it for the dramatic effect Erin had forgone. _She should have just told us everything and then slammed the door in our faces. We deserve it, for letting this go on as long as it had. Oh Erin, I’m so sorry…_

She clenched her fists hard enough to feel her nails bite into her palms, but didn’t stop, trying to keep her own tears at bay. She couldn’t break down now. Not now, not when Erin needed her to tell Abby and Patty what had been going on. Not when she needed Holtzmann to do what she couldn’t, which was help her get out of there. With Erin gone, Holtz was the only person left who knew, who could tell them, who could convince them to help her. And whether Erin believed it or not, she _needed_ Holtzmann to be strong now.

After being sufficiently sure that she had enough control over her emotions, she turned around to Abby, slowly and controlled. The other woman nearly took a step back when she saw what she only could describe as murderous rage in the blonde’s eyes. She couldn’t remember ever having seen Holtzmann so angry, and impossibly, that rage only seemed to grow more when her eyes met Abby’s.

“What. Have. You. Done”, Holtzmann pressed out between grit teeth, sounding as if she had to keep herself from actually punching something – or someone, “do you have _any_ idea what you have done? Any idea at all?”

“You know that this would have happened anyway”, Abby countered, though it was obvious just the tiniest sliver of doubt had crept into her voice. “Sooner or later. You’ve seen how she’s been acting; she was just going to leave again, back to her world of academia. I made it happen sooner, if that’s what you mean.”

For a moment, she thought Holtzmann would actually go over and punch her, the engineer’s fists trembling as she stalked closer. Abby wondered what had brought on this reaction. She knew Holtzmann had a terrible crush on Erin, but just the knowledge that the engineer wouldn’t be seeing Erin again on a daily basis wouldn’t have prompted this reaction. Nor would the fact that Erin would have left her like that; or at least, she wouldn’t have taken it out on Abby had that been the case.

But as the dark-haired scientist was pondering this, Holtzmann paused, clearly trying to get a hold of her emotions. Again, Erin needed her; she couldn’t lose her temper now. So instead, she spoke again, her voice oddly calm and controlled. “Wait here. I’ll be right back.”

As the engineer went upstairs, Abby looked at Patty in worry, the historian appearing just as confused at what just had happened as she was.

“Let’s hope she’s not gonna get a gun from up there and shoot me”, Abby joked, but the joke fell flat, and she sounded nervous; neither of the two women were entirely sure Holtz wasn’t up there getting a gun.

When Holtzmann came back down the stairs – not via the pole, they both noticed, which just prompted them to worry more – she held no weapon though. Instead, she was holding a notebook, making them both jump when she tossed it on the table in front of them.

“Read.” she said, crossing her arms over her chest as she glared at Abby and Patty. When neither of them made a move to touch it – possibly afraid it might be explode – Holtzmann snapped. “Read, dammit!”

Patty reached out almost automatically, giving Abby a worried glance as she picked the book up.

“Holtzy”, she said, not opening it, not yet, “what is this? What’s going on?”

“It’s data”, Holtzmann replied, a suspicious sheen in her eyes now as she tried to keep a tremor out of her voice. “Data I collected, like a good little scientist. Erin would be so proud.” And oh god, the mention of Erin only made it harder for her to keep herself from breaking down right there and then. Because what if they were too late? What if she would never see Erin again? What if she never saw that beautiful, dazzling smile again, that smile she got every time Erin praised her work. What if she never saw Erin smile again at all?

She felt her voice break as she lashed out again, her hands slamming on the table as she glared at Patty and Abby. “Now read, dammit!”

Patty gave Holtzmann another worried look, but opened the book at last, and looked down on the first page. Abby kept her eyes on Holtzmann, clearly worried for the blonde engineer, but when Patty started to read out loud, her gaze snapped to the historian at once.

“Is Erin in an…”, Patty started, then broke off, her eyes briefly widening. She looked up at Holtzmann, but the engineer said nothing. She just stared back at her, daring her to tell her she was being ridiculous without reading the full thing, and after a moment, Patty started over.

“Is Erin in an abusive relationship? Holtzy, what the…”, she began, while Abby let out a flat “What”, as well. And all at once, Holtzmann seemed to lose all her composure, slamming both fists down on the table again, and making them both jump. They had never seen her like this, and that was disconcerting in and of itself, but what she said next was even worse.

“Fucking read it!” the blonde yelled, making them both flinch back from her, “it’s all in there, _all_ of it. Every single damn thing _he_ did to her, and changed about her, and you _never! Noticed_! You never noticed, and when _I_ did you told me I was just fucking jealous and paranoid! You didn’t even _listen_ to me, _not once_ , not even when it was so _glaringly obvious_ that Erin wasn’t Erin anymore. Not even that; you, Abby, you- _you fucking kicked her out and sent her to him!”_

Too freaked out by this rage and pain to talk back, Patty started going through the book. And as she did, her eyes grew impossibly wide at all the things she read in there; all the red flags Holtzmann had noted down, all the changes in Erin’s behaviour, all the changes neither of them had managed to pick up on somehow. Abby was standing next to her by now so she could read with her, and she was paling further and further each time Patty turned the page.

“How did we”, Abby began after a few minutes had been spent just staring at all the horrible things Holtzmann had noted down, her voice cracking and forcing her to start over, “how did we never notice any of this?”

“Yeah, good fucking question”, Holtzmann spat out, making them both look at her again, “you’re supposed to be her _best friend_ and you never noticed a thing, didn’t you? You didn’t notice when she stopped having snacks, or when she started replacing fast food with only fish or salad. You only judged her when her clothing changed, and you didn’t notice that she stopped smiling. _She fucking stopped smiling_ , Abby, how do you not notice when _your best friend stops smiling_?”

All at once, her rage seemed to puff away, and there was only pain left. Because Holtzmann had been paying close enough attention to Erin to know that when something disappeared, when Phil took something else away that made Erin so completely Erin, it didn’t come back. And if Erin had stopped smiling, and if they didn’t get her out… She would actually never see Erin smile again. She slumped down onto the nearest chair, and rested her head in her hands, tears clearly audible in her voice when she went on.

“I noticed”, she said, and neither Patty nor Abby were sure if she was talking to them or to herself at this point, “I noticed, and I couldn’t help her. And you just told me I’m jealous. And now she can’t come back here because you kicked her out. She was safe here, at least a little, and now she can’t come back here… She has to stay with _him_ , all the time, and she might… He might…”

Her voice drifted off, the blonde curling in on herself as she tried to block out the images of what he might be doing to Erin. How he might be destroying every last bit of her beautiful mind, filling it with poison and letting her believe she was so much less than she was.

“She still has things here”, Abby said the first thing which came to her mind, prompting Holtzmann to look up at her again. The mere sound of Abby’s voice, one which still rung with betrayal in the engineer’s ears, being enough to cause the anger to flood back into her system. “she’ll come pick them up… right…?”

“Will she?”, the engineer demanded to know, coming to her feet again, too agitated to remain seated, “Do you think he’ll let her go back to us again? Do you think he’ll let us see her at his place? That was probably half the reason why he got her to move in with him so fast, so he can keep us away from her, isolate her… And you know she has no one else, you _know_. We’re her friends, her family, and we sent her away!”

“He’ll want to keep up appearances”, Patty said, not quite sure if this was correct – she was a historian, not a psychologist – but she was eager to make Holtzmann calm down, before she might end up hitting Abby after all, “and, I don’t know, rub it in that she… can’t come back here. Getting her stuff with her will be like that final thing.”

“…I hope for her sake that you’re right”, Holtzmann gave back, running a trembling hand through her hair, “because if you’re not, he’ll kill her. He might not outright murder her, but he’ll kill everything which makes her who she is.”

Abby looked as if she was about to feel sick, and even though she knew it was somewhat mean and not helping, Holtzmann felt inappropriately satisfied at this reaction. Because despite everything, they _finally_ believed her… Even if this might have happened way too late.

“…I’m not going home tonight”, Holtzmann broke the uncomfortable silence which had formed after a few moments, “I’ll stay here. Just in case he gets the idea to come here in the middle of the night and sneak out her stuff like a fucking thief.”

“I’ll stay with you babygirl”, Patty replied at once, clearly feeling bad for having dismissed Holtzmann when she had come to her earlier in this whole mess. “So you won’t have to face him alone, in case he does come here.” The historian wondered how much pain and suffering could have been avoided for Erin if she’d just had listened to Holtzmann, if she hadn’t dismissed her so easily. Holtzmann may be crazy at times, but she wasn’t stupid, and she _knew_ this. But Holtz’s obvious crush on Erin had blinded Patty’s judgement more than she cared to admit, and as a result, she might now be risking losing one of her closest friends. She felt well and truly awful.

“I’ll stay, too”, Abby added at once, still looking as if she might throw up any moment. She picked up the notebook and fiddled nervously with it, then dropped it back down onto the table, clearly not knowing what to do with her hands, and finding it hard to look Holtzmann in the eye. She felt nothing but guilt, knowing that she carried a lot of blame in this situation. Holtzmann was right; Erin was her best friend. And she _had_ noticed the changes, _had_ noticed how unhappy Erin had looked. But paranoid as she was, she had taken those changes as signs that Erin was going to leave her again. The redhead had always been more concerned with her reputation than Abby was, and with Phil probably wanting her to be successful too, Abby had been convinced Erin would see that she wasn’t going to get the recognition she always wanted if she stayed here.

She realized now how wrong she had been, and wondered if Erin would ever forgive her if they got her out.

“I’m sorry”, she softly said after a few seconds; Patty nodded to show that she was sorry, too, and now, it was Holtzmann’s turn to dismiss them.

“Don’t tell that to me. Tell that to _her_ , if we ever get her out of there”, she coldly said, already turning towards the stairs, “I’ll get some work done, call me in case anything happens.”

They both just nodded, neither trying to stop her; and as she walked off, Abby and Patty exchanged sorrowful glances. Both of them felt like the worst friends in the world now, unable to stop wondering how they could have missed all of this, how they had practically watched Erin wither away in front of their eyes and hadn’t been aware of what was happening. How they could have let their own prejudices cloud their judgement so much to the point where they may have just been the cause of placing one of their closest friends in a situation where she would be beyond help.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Everyone! Check out the awesome Spotify playlist Dimphy made for this fic :D https://play.spotify.com/user/dimphyyyyy/playlist/4bNKY3F5ZXpG0JJrsriQxs - thank you so much :D


	16. Chapter 16

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for the use of an anti-gay slur towards the end of the chapter. All other usual warnings probably also apply.

Phil didn’t show up during the night to collect Erin’s belongings, and when Holtzmann woke up the next morning – way too early, she noted, the sun not even being up yet – she was worried sick at once. She wondered what she could do should he not show up during the day. Was there even anything they _could_ do? They had his address, but they had no grounds to be able to enter there. Domestic abuse cases were hard to prove, and could only be made in the rare cases where the victim stepped forward. And after what had occurred yesterday, Holtzmann doubted Erin would admit to Phil hurting her. It seemed more likely than not that Erin would be beyond help if he didn’t bring her back here, and the mere thought of that made Holtzmann want to break something, preferably Phil’s face.

Luckily, it turned out that Patty’s prediction had been correct. Everyone had gathered downstairs, anxiously watching the door, making all three women jump when at 8 o’clock on the dot a loud knock echoed through the firehouse. Knowing Kevin didn’t start until 10 at the earliest – and knowing he didn’t knock at all – they all knew this could only be one person on the other end.

Holtz was the first to reach the door, with Abby and Patty right behind her. When she pulled it open, Abby felt sick all over again, the question she had been wrestling with all night once more taking up all of her mind.

_How did I not notice this? How? Oh my God, Erin, I’m so sorry._

It was as if she was seeing her best friend through whole new eyes, the Erin she saw looking nothing like the vibrant woman she’d known and come to befriend over the years. She looked small and pale and tired, all features which were only emphasized with Phil standing next to her. The smug smile on his face was a stark contrast to the hollowness in Erin’s eyes, the redhead not even looking at them as she stood next to her boyfriend. _Her abuser_ , Abby’s mind corrected, which only served to make her feel more terrible.

His arm was around her waist again, but not for support, Abby could tell that at once. He was holding on to her hip just a bit too tight, his fingers making visible dents, as if to make sure she couldn’t bolt from his side and into the relative safety of the firehouse. She also noted he barely acknowledged that she was there otherwise, not even looking at her when he spoke up. It was as if Erin was just a trophy to him. A prop serving to flatter his own ego. She wondered how long this had been going on for.

She wondered how she hadn’t noticed this at the gala, recalling vividly from Holtz’s notes how their dynamic had been equally bad back then.

“We’re here to get Erin’s stuff”, he told them, sounding as smug as he was looking, making Holtzmann’s fists clench at her sides. As Phil spoke, she noted how Erin was still just standing there, quietly nodding along in agreement, still not lifting her gaze from the ground. “she’s quitting this ghostbusting business for good. Now move aside please and let’s get this over with; I have more important things to do.”

“We know”, Holtzmann spoke. “and this stops now.” Abby noticed how oddly calm and controlled the engineer sounded, the tone of her voice eerily similar to the one she had used again her just yesterday. She noted how Erin seemed to stiffen a little at those words, but the movement was barely noticeable.

“I don’t know what you think you know”, Phil countered, “and I don’t really care. My time is limited and precious, so you either let us inside now, or you’ll just have to throw out her stuff.”

“ _She_ can go in”, Abby replied, hoping that Erin wouldn’t misinterpret the cold tone of her voice directed at her, “but not you.”

“Well, then”, Phil replied, shrugging, his grip on Erin tightening even further, keeping her from actually moving away from him and inside, “that’s too bad then, Erin. I guess you won’t get your stuff. Never mind, I’ll replace it. You know _everything_ can be replaced.”

_Even you. Especially you._

He didn’t say the last parts out loud, but the implication was clear. It was clear in the tone of his voice, in the way he spoke to Erin, in the way the redhead just nodded without the thought of arguing with him even coming to mind. By now, all three of them knew that he had said something like this to Erin during the course of the relationship – if this mess even could be called that – and that she heard the unspoken threat. It made Abby’s heart break all over again for her friend, who still hadn’t looked up at them, and just seemed to be preparing herself to turn away from them for good.

 _She doesn’t even look resigned anymore_ , Abby realized, fear gripping her heart as Phil tightened his grip around Erin, preparing to get her away from her last shot at freedom. _She just looks… Empty._ She was about to do something to keep him from hurting Erin any more – she may have been the worst friend ever to Erin, but she wasn’t about to let her stay in this mess – when Holtzmann stepped forward.

Her fists were trembling, and she gave the man a glare which, if looks could kill, would have made him drop dead on the spot and would have removed his ghost in the next instant.

“Take. Your. Fucking. Hands. Off. Of. Her.”, she pressed out between teeth grit so hard that the muscles in her jaw were working visibly beneath the skin, “You’ve hurt her enough. You won’t hurt her again.”

“Erin”, Abby added before Phil could reply to that, stepping forward with an outstretched hand, “please. Come on, come in here. We won’t let him hurt you, I promise.”

“Erin is done with you people”, Phil spoke for her, and that alone made Holtzmann’s blood even hotter, “She knows your true colours after what you did yesterday. Don’t you, Erin?” He turned to the redhead at his side, the first time he properly acknowledged her presence. “You know I’ll be the only to ever care for you. These people are not your friends, you _know_ this.”

He clearly had expected Erin to simply agree, and walk away with him, simple as that. And for a moment, it looked exactly like that was what would happen, with Erin finally looking up and at the three Ghostbusters still standing in front of the firehouse. She looked like she was about to parrot those same words back at them, to tell them that she was done for good, her hollow eyes making it clear she had been reduced to nothing but a puppet at his hands.

But then her eyes met Holtzmann’s, and the words seemed to die on her lips.

Holtzmann, who had always tried to make her smile. Holtzmann, who had _begged_ her to stay. Holtzmann, who looked absolutely desperate as she looked at Erin. The physicist could see the engineer’s heart breaking in that look, could see how that look held something more than just the pity she expected, though she couldn’t quite put her finger on what exactly it was she saw in those blue eyes.

When Holtzmann noticed this, she quickly spoke up again. “He’s lying”, Holtzmann hurriedly told her, not sure if she’d be able to reach her, but knowing she had to try. She had to try, she couldn’t just let him take her away for good, she couldn’t just give up on Erin without a fight. “Erin, _please,_ you know he is. I lo… we all love you. We do. Just, please, Erin… Please come back to us.”

“Please”, Phil scoffed, even smugger now at the desperation in Holtzmann’s voice. “She knows you’ll just drop her like a rock within days. She knows I’m the only one who’ll ever love her. That’s all someone like her can ever hope for.”

His grip tightened again, and it made Erin wince once more. And all at once, this, combined with what he just had said, and the way Erin just took it and accepted it as truth, this awful statement that only an abusive, manipulative scumbag like him would ever love her, made Holtzmann lose all control, her world awash in red as she let out an unarticulated yell and shot forward.

“Holtzmann!” Abby had time to cry out, and then her fist flew, and nailed Phil in the mouth. She felt his front teeth tear up her knuckles, but didn’t care, going after him when he stumbled back, not even realizing that she was crying and talking as she did so.

“Fuck you, scumbag, I’ll kill you”, she pressed out between harsh, painful sobs, not sure if she was crying from anger or from pain for Erin or both, “how _dare_ you! She’s my everything and I love her and you just fucking stand here and…!”

Phil recovered from the surprise of being hit, spitting out a mouthful of blood before he retaliated. He had better aim than Holtzmann, but she had good reflexes, and so she avoided to have him break her nose, turning her head just a fraction the last moment, taking the hit partly on the nose and partly beneath the eye instead, stars exploding in front of her eyes as she hit the pavement.

“Fine people you spend your time with, Erin.” Phil said, rubbing his fist while he glared at the dazed engineer, “Tell this lunatic to cut it out, or this is it. And you know that once I leave you, that’s it. You’ll have no one. You’ll be sad and lonely Ghost Girl again.”

If Holtzmann hadn’t been struggling to not faint, puke, or both after the hit she had taken, she, like Abby and Patty, could have pinpointed the exact moment he finally went too far and something inside Erin, something which so far had bent, but had not quite broken, snapped.

As he lashed out to hit Holtzmann again, Erin stopped him, gripping his wrist as she looked him straight in the eye.

“You can hit me”, the physicist said, each word all too clear and like a stab in Holtzmann’s heart, “You can hurt me all you like. I deserve it. But you will _not_ touch my friends.”

Phil had a moment to look surprised, not having expected this kind of reaction from her. Erin had stopped talking back to him _months_ ago, he had been sure he had managed to get that little deviant streak out of her. His gaze turned angry not long after, Erin trembling a little as she realized the mistake she’d just made. She was about to apologize, to _beg_ him not to hurt her like she knew he was about to, when a loud wail sounded from beside her, and a flash of blonde shot past her.

And then Holtzmann was on him, with a mixture of cry and sob, hitting blindly, not caring where her punches landed, and after a while not able to see it anymore, anyway, tears blurring her vision as all the pain and fear she had bottled up for the past six months all burst free at once. All her worries for Erin, all her pain and heartbreak, all the anger she had felt at Phil and at Abby and Patty for not believing her or seeing what was happening. She wanted to hit him for every tear he had caused Erin to shed, for every moment she’d had to spend thinking no one else would ever love her. She wanted to hit him for all the pain _she_ had felt, watching her physicist wither away in front of her eyes and being powerless to do anything about it. She wanted to hurt him, wanted to _kill_ him.

She was pretty sure she would have, too, if it hadn’t been for Erin.

Erin, who had gone through so much already. Erin, who had stopped him from going after Holtzmann, despite knowing she would get hurt for it. Erin, whom she loved more than life itself, who was currently crying on the sidewalk, slowly sinking down to her knees as she begged Holtzmann to _please stop_.

The desperation in her voice caused Holtzmann to cease her assault on Phil, who took the opportunity to scramble up from the floor and glare at Erin. “Fine.” He spat, as Holtzmann made her way over to Erin’s side, wiping away at the blood streaming from her nose. “Good luck on your own, Erin. I hope this dyke was worth it.” He made his retreat immediately after that, clearly fearing for his health with the way the other two women still standing were looking at him.

 _He’s leaving, he’s leaving,_ part of Erin screamed, the tears streaming down her face as she looked at Phil’s retreating form. _He’s leaving, and now I’ll be alone. I’ll be alone, and no one will love me, and the ghostbusters will just kick me out too, and I have nothing left now. I have nothing left, what am I going to do?_

She was still crying as she felt a set of arms wrap around her, and the familiar scent of cinnamon and motor oil filled her nose as Holtzmann held her, rubbing her back and whispering “it’s okay, it’s gonna be okay”, over and over. It wasn’t long before Abby and Patty also joined in the hug, Erin feeling their warmth wrap around her. The entire thing was messy and confusing, but it was a hug. And for the first time in _months_ , Erin didn’t feel alone anymore.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To get ahead of the obvious 'But how is this going to go on for 34 more chapters then?!' question some of you will probably have... Do you really think Phil didn't do any permanent damage? Do you really think just because Erin is out she's going to be immediately okay? This story has been mostly told from Holtzmann's perspective so far; you have not seen even a tenth of the true extent of the damage he's done to Erin. 
> 
> Abuse, especially long-term abuse, leaves its emotional scars. This issue is a serious one, and there is a lot of story to still be told here. Just because people aren't abused on a daily basis any longer does not mean they are immediately back to their old selves. This takes time, and effort, and love can't fix everything. But trust me when I say that being there for your friends and/or loved ones, whether they've just gotten out of abusive relationships or even if they're still in them, helps. Those gestures don't go unnoticed. They might not fix everything, but they help, more than you probably know.


	17. Chapter 17

After all the crying Erin had done the previous evening, part of her was honestly surprised that there still were any tears left she _could_ cry. And not only did she still have tears left, it seemed like she was physically incapable of stopping it. She was trapped in a vicious cycle, the knowledge that she was crying in front of people making her feel terrible, which only made her cry more as a result. After all, how many times had Phil told her that this was childish behaviour? That only children cried, and that she should just suck it up? That crying only made her seem weak, and that people would undoubtedly exploit that, and that she should be lucky that he wasn’t that type of person?

Again, she wondered what the ghostbusters must be thinking of her now, now that they had seen how pathetic she truly was. She couldn’t even get a single person to love her, she had chased away the one person who ever could, and now she was going to be all alone again. Because how long would it be until they too left her? How long until they sent her away again? How long until they realized how weak and pathetic she truly was, until they told her they didn’t want her around anymore?

As she sat on the sidewalk in front of the firehouse, she kept her face buried in Holtzmann’s neck, breathing in the calming scent of the engineer. She felt Holtzmann’s arms around her, the calloused but tender hands rubbing her back as her whole body trembled with the violent sobs which kept ripping free from her throat.

She vaguely heard Abby and Patty talk, and was vaguely aware of their attempts to comfort her, but all she could focus on was Holtzmann. Holtzmann, who had tried so hard to make her feel better despite knowing how weak Erin was. Holtzmann, who had always been a source of comfort to Erin, who had actually tried to help her. Holtzmann, who had actually physically fought Phil off for her.

Holtzmann, who said she loved her.

She wondered if that thought had actually prompted a physical reaction from her, as Holtzmann spoke up again not long after that thought had entered her mind.

“Erin?” Her voice sounded soft, caring, and Erin felt herself bury her face further into the crook of Holtzmann’s neck in response. “Erin, honey. I need you to let go of me for a moment so we—”

The thought of Holtzmann letting go of her made her chest so tight she could barely breathe, and she whimpered as she shook her head, clinging as tightly as she could to the blonde. She knew it was wrong, she _knew_ she shouldn’t be forcing Holtzmann to be in her presence, but she couldn’t help herself. She felt selfish, and pathetic, and disgusting, but she _really_ didn’t want to be alone. Not now, not yet. Not when she knew that, as soon as she let go of Holtzmann, she’d be alone for good. She just couldn’t handle that.

Holtzmann’s heart broke all over again at the whimper escaping Erin’s lips, and she immediately dismissed any thoughts of having Erin let go of her, even just to help her inside. Judging by the way the physicist was holding on to her for dear life, she wouldn’t be able to take being left alone for now, and she’d only make it worse if she forced her into this.

“Okay, okay”, she quickly said, giving her best to keep her voice low and soothing, even though that was hard, what with the pain pulsing through her face and the blood trickling from her nose. None of that mattered right now, though. The pain Erin was currently going through, the pain she had been forced to endure for _months_ , made Holtz’s wounds pale in comparison. Instead, she wracked her brain to think of another way to get Erin inside, one which didn’t involve leaving her alone for even a second. “Forget I ever said that. But we have to get inside, okay? I’m not going to hurt you, I’ll just…”

She adjusted her hold a bit, hoping that there weren’t any bruises she might put pressure on when she kept one arm around Erin’s back, and moved the other beneath her knees to pick Erin up. And while Holtzmann knew she was in good shape, and was actually rather far from weak, she was still incredibly shocked at how easy it actually was to pick Erin up.

Erin had always been slim – sometimes, Holtzmann had referred to her as beanpole, just to make her blush – but this was alarming all over again. She weighed next to nothing, and she didn’t even feel the slightest strain on her arms as she carried Erin inside. Hell, their _proton packs_ were heavier than Erin was now, and Holtz supposed she should be grateful Erin had had other reasons not to go on busts with them. She doubted the physicist would even have been able to carry her own pack without fainting.

Abby and Patty moved back when Holtzmann straightened up, carrying the still quietly sobbing Erin in her arms now. The physicist kept her face buried against the blonde’s neck, the feeling of her hot tears on the skin there clenching up the engineer’s heart.

“It’s okay”, she whispered to her as she carried her inside, “it’s okay, you’re safe now, I promise.”

She moved to the couch at the back of the ground floor, the closest and yet most comfortable place she could find on such short notice. She could, in theory, have carried Erin up the stairs without effort, but she didn’t want to risk hurting the redhead any further by moving her around too much.

Instead, she lowered herself on the soft cushions as carefully as possible, not wanting to make any injuries Erin might have hidden beneath her clothing worse, ending up with the physicist practically in her lap. Erin’s grip hadn’t relaxed at all, the physicist still holding on to Holtz for dear life as she kept her face buried in the crook of the blonde’s neck. She had stopped audibly crying by now, but the engineer could still feel her body wracking with sobs, and could still feel the hot tears streaming down Erin’s face, both signalling that the redhead was still a far cry from okay.

“Okay”, Holtzmann said once she could be sure they both were secure on the couch, her worry only growing when she realized that she actually had no idea what to say to make this better, “alright… Erin? It’s okay now, you’re safe, he won’t get near you again, I promise, we won’t let him.”

“We won’t”, Abby echoed, while Patty just wringed her hands, thinking back with horror to all the times she had told Erin how happy she was for her and how much she deserved the good times with Phil, “He’s never gonna touch you again… Erin I’m so sorry…”

Erin didn’t react the slightest to her, just kept holding on to Holtzmann, which made the other women wonder if Erin had even heard them at all. Each of them wondered if perhaps it wouldn’t be smarter to call an ambulance, just so they’d give Erin something to calm her down enough to speak, or to let her sleep, or…

Slowly but surely, it was becoming apparent to all of them that they had absolutely no idea how to fix this.

Holtzmann just held her, rubbing her back and breathing out a small sigh of relief when she felt Erin’s grip slacken just a little. That had to be a good sign, right? That had to be a sign Erin believed they weren’t just going to leave her…

Right?

“I’m sorry”, Erin whispered into her neck, barely loud enough for Holtzmann to hear. “for… for causing all this trouble… For making you put up with me… I’m sorry…”

“Erin, no”, Holtzmann gave back at once, moving one hand to rub her back as Erin slowly dissolved into sobs again. “you have _nothing_ to be sorry for, okay? _Nothing_. We’re just happy we got you away from this guy. None of this is your fault.”

“Yes, yes”, Abby hurriedly agreed, disconcerted by how Erin kept her face hidden, as if she was trying to be invisible to the world, “We’re happy he can’t hurt you anymore, we…”

_Away from Phil_ , Erin’s mind shrieked, drowning out what else Abby was saying as realization sunk in once again, _You’re away from Phil now, which means you’re gonna be alone. You know they don’t really care about you. They just pity you, as soon as that runs out they’re gonna kick you out again. They’ve done it before, they’ll do it again, and you have no place to live anymore cause you’re away from Phil. You’re gonna be homeless and alone, stupid pathetic little Ghost Girl living on the streets because she has no one who cares about her because she’s pathetic and—_

“Erin”, Holtzmann said in alarm, realizing at once what was happening. She had witnessed Erin having a panic attack before after all, and the way the physicist started shaking in her arms and how her breath quickened made it more than obvious. “Erin, honey, look at me. Look at me.”

Erin just shook her head, her breathing quickening even more as she trembled in Holtzmann’s arms, clearly torn between trying to get closer to the engineer and pushing herself further away to run and hide so no one could see how pathetic she was.

“What’s happening?!” Abby demanded to know, as alarmed as the engineer, her horror only growing when Holtzmann mumbled “panic attack”, the quick response making her wonder if the blonde had witnessed this happening to Erin before, and why they had known nothing about this.

Keeping her focus on Erin, Holtzmann figured that she had to make sure the physicist had room to breathe. Fearing that completely letting go of her would only make it worse though, she kept one arm around the redhead as she leaned back, the scarf around her neck catching her eye as an idea hit. Figuring getting the scarf away would give the physicist some more breathing room, she moved one hand to remove the fabric from around Erin’s neck, only to feel her heart break all over again when she saw what it had been hiding.

“Lord have mercy.”

Patty sounded as shocked as Holtzmann felt, and Abby made some sort of choking noise, as if she was trying not to puke. The engineer herself just stared, Erin’s panic attack momentarily forgotten as she found herself unable to take her eyes off the angry, purple and dark blue bruise which began somewhere beneath the physicist’s collar and spread up all the way to her throat. The bruise which had undoubtedly been there since yesterday. The bruise which she remembered Patty putting down to a hickey. The bruise which she remembered suspecting was so much worse than Erin had made it seem.

She had known Phil had been hurting Erin. But to actually see it was something else entirely, the blonde swallowing thickly as she stared at the mark that had been left on Erin’s skin.

Somehow, through the haze of panic, Erin realized what just had happened, had realized Holtzmann had taken the scarf away, which only heightened her panic. Because all of them would see now. They would see the bruise, they would see how weak and stupid she had been, and the panic grew until it was an iron band around her chest and a lump in her throat, not allowing her a single breath anymore.

“No”, she wheezed, trying to curl into herself even further, to make herself as small as humanly possible, “no, don’t… can’t let them see, never let them see, stupid, weak…”

“Erin”, Holtzmann’s voice reached her through the panic clouding her mind, along with the engineer rubbing her back again, “Erin, no, none of this is your fault, it’s okay, it’s okay…”

Erin’s only response was that she buried her face against Holtzmann’s neck again, hiding herself from the world. Holding her close, Holtzmann kept rubbing her back, telling her over and over that it wasn’t her fault and that it was okay, until the panic slowly began to subside. But it was obvious that the shame and humiliation were still there, and all three of them knew it would be with her for a long time to come.

* * *

 

Neither of them was sure how much time had passed since Phil had run off, but events clearly had taken a massive toll on Erin. At some point, she had drifted into an uneasy sleep, curled up against Holtzmann. Even now she still looked pale and exhausted, only a shadow of the person she used to be, and it made all three women feel even worse.

How could they have let it get this bad?

As Holtzmann covered her up with a blanket and carefully pulled off her shoes, she could feel her heart clench up yet again at how small and vulnerable Erin looked. More so than everyone else, Holtzmann was fully aware that the haggardness of the physicist’s face wasn’t just caused by her dismal mental state, thinking back to how frighteningly light Erin had been when she had picked her up in her arms.

Behind her, Abby found herself unable to look away from the bruise still visible despite the blanket, asking herself again and again how she could not have noticed any of this – and how much worse Erin might be bruised beneath her clothing. She felt sick as she thought to herself that certainly, this hadn’t been the first time Phil had beaten her.

_Oh Erin…_

“I’ll stay here with her”, Holtzmann distracted her from those thoughts, the engineer not once taking her eyes off Erin, “you guys go on home.”

“Maybe we should stay, too”, Patty suggested, a little uneasy when the engineer didn’t even glance her way. “just in case that… that guy comes back…?”

“No need”, Holtzmann gave back, still not looking away from the physicist on the couch, “and, don’t be offended, but I’m not sure she’ll be happy if all three of us are around when she wakes up again. Right now, she’s ashamed and terrified that we all know. No need to remind her of that by hovering around her when she wakes up.”

Abby had to admit that this was a good point, but rightly suspected it wasn’t the only reason Holtzmann didn’t want them to stay. After all, the engineer had been the only one who had realized what was happening to Erin, and when she had tried to alert them to it, all she had gotten was dismissal and the accusations that she was jealous and paranoid.

Erin wasn’t the only one who wouldn’t be pleased to see either her or Patty around.

“Alright”, she thus said, before Patty could protest, with an apologetic look at the engineer, “but you call us in case anything happens, or if you need anything, okay? We’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Yeah”, Holtzmann mumbled, and after another worried look at Erin, Abby got moving. Patty followed a moment later, after another unhappy look at the physicist, Holtzmann looking at them go briefly before her gaze focused on Erin again.

“You’re gonna be okay”, she whispered, not wanting to wake her up, figuring she could need the rest. The dark rings beneath Erin’s eyes showed that she hadn’t slept all too well lately, something which Holtz had noticed had become a common occurrence after she had moved in with Phil. Gently running her hand through Erin’s hair, she swallowed as she looked at the bruise again, wondering how many others Erin was and had been hiding.

She was scared to find out the answer.

Shaking her head, she eventually got up and made her way upstairs to get one of her projects. Holtzmann knew it would be difficult to concentrate, but she also knew she had to keep busy; she’d drive herself crazy if she didn’t. So as she sat down at a table not too far away from the couch, she tinkered away as Erin slept, hoping to god the physicist would feel a little better once she woke up.


	18. Chapter 18

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All usual warnings apply, and this chapter contains descriptions of injuries.

When Erin woke up again, it took her a moment to realize where she was, the surroundings unfamiliar to her at first. She wondered how long she’d been asleep, and felt fear grip her heart when she realized she was still in the firehouse. Had she missed dinner? Was she late? Oh god, Phil _hated_ it when she got home late. He already had so much to put up with…

That’s when she remembered what had happened earlier. How Abby had sent her away. How Phil had taken her back to get her stuff. How Holtzmann had hit him, and told her she loved her.

( _Had that really happened?_ It all seemed like a strange dream to her.)

Speaking of Holtzmann… She had been hearing soft, clinking sounds in the backgrounds, sounds she automatically associated with the blonde engineer. Sounds synonymous to comfort and safety, in a way, and Erin found herself relaxing just the tiniest bit at the sight of the engineer tinkering away a few feet away from her. She still wondered how much of her memories were actually accurate, and how soon Holtzmann’s pity was going to run out, but for now, she was content to just watch her work, the knowledge that she was there being enough to calm Erin.

Belatedly, she realized that she had been covered up with a soft blanket, and that her uncomfortable heels had been removed. Her feet ached from having worn no other sort of shoe the previous months (Phil had insisted that she wear heels, telling her they made her legs look great) even after the sleep she’d gotten, and she could feel her bruises, too. But for the first time in weeks, she wasn’t terrified that she’d do something wrong again and give Phil reason to be angry at her the moment she opened her eyes.

Carefully, aware of the throbbing in her ribs and kidneys, Erin sat up, the blanket soundlessly sliding off and onto the floor. She wanted to speak up, and alert the blonde to the fact that she was awake, but she didn’t dare to, not wanting to tear her out of her work. She remembered all too well how angry Phil would get whenever she interrupted him when he was working.

_Some of us have important work to do, Erin, certainly you don’t expect me to drop everything I’m doing just because you have a sudden urge to talk trivialities?_

“Hey cupcake”, Holtzmann’s soft voice interrupted her dark thoughts, making her look up from the spot on the floor her gaze had focused on as Phil’s voice had echoed through her mind, “feeling a bit better?”

Erin shrugged in response, not feeling much of anything at the moment. Which, in truth, was a bit worrisome, but still better than the panic which had clouded her mind shortly before she’d fallen into a restless sleep. She was barely aware that her gaze dropped to the floor again as she mumbled her reply. “Okay, I guess. Sorry for interrupting your work…”

Another apology, Holtzmann noted, immediately feeling bad for her friend again. She wondered how often she had apologized to Phil for such trivialities in the course of the relationship, how deeply he had it ingrained into her mind that whatever she said and did was wrong if he hadn’t specifically approved of it first.

“Don’t be”, she said, putting the wrench she’d been using aside – after a brief glance to make sure nothing would explode if she’d stop working on the project right this moment, “you can interrupt me any time.”

She smiled at Erin as she moved to sit down next to her. It didn’t surprise her that the physicist didn’t smile back, not truly, but it still hurt, and she found herself wondering how long it might take until smiling would be easy again for the redhead. Because Erin would be smiling again, she would make sure of it. She didn’t want to live in a world where Erin Gilbert never smiled anymore.

“Can I get you anything?” Holtzmann went on instead of remarking on the apology, “something to drink maybe or, I dunno, food? I got an awesome muffin hidden away in my lab upstairs. It might be slightly radioactive, but we can share. Then we’ll both glow in the dark.”

She grinned at Erin, a typical manic Holtzmann grin, and pre-Phil Erin would have been amused and appalled at the same time. She would have smiled at her while scolding her for keeping food in areas where it could potentially become radioactive. This Erin though, this miserable and hurting and clearly traumatized Erin, just shook her head, and Holtzmann wanted to punch Phil all over again.

And maybe strangle him a bit, too, for good measure.

“Okay, no muffin, then”, she said, careful to keep her anger at Phil from showing through her features, fearing that Erin might think it was directed at her if she’d let it show, “but I’m quite thirsty, so I’ll make myself some tea. You want some, too?”

This time, she got a little nod at least, and wondered if Erin only had agreed because she’d said she would make the tea anyway – _so it won’t be a hassle for you, if you make tea anyway, she can have some too, right_ – and it made her heart clench up all over again.

“Okay”, she said out loud, briefly touching Erin’s arm, and somehow managing to not let her pain show when the physicist flinched at the unexpected movement of her hand towards her body, “I’ll be right back, then.”

Erin nodded, and Holtzmann came to her feet, moving to the kitchen. There, after some rummaging, she found the box of tea called “Autumn Leaves”. Aware of Erin’s massive liking for that certain season, figured she might as well make some of that, to make her feel at least a tiny bit better. She hadn’t missed how that was one of the redhead’s go-to comfort drinks, and she figured that right now, Erin would be more appreciative of that than hot chocolate.

She readied two cups, then filled the electric kettle with enough water for both of them, footsteps coming up behind her just after she’d switched the kettle on.

Upon turning, she found Erin standing in the doorway. The physicist was looking down on the floor again, and had her arms crossed over her stomach as if to cover herself up. Despite being a few inches taller than Holtzmann, she still looked small, and all the engineer wanted to do was just rush over and hug her, just to make her look less lost, less hurting. But she forced herself to stay where she was, knowing that she’d only freak Erin out if she’d run at her like that.

“I felt… I don’t want to be alone”, Erin mumbled, eyes still downcast, “I’m sorry to bother you, I…” She trailed off, and her lips trembled as she once more found herself on the verge of tears. She hated herself as she felt her eyes burning, telling herself that this was ridiculous. She was an adult, and a semi-respected scientist in her field, not a little kid. There was no reason for her to be crying at all, let alone for her to be crying as much as she was.

Wiping at her eyes, she felt somewhat angry at herself, as well as guilty that she was making Holtzmann put up with her like this. Surely the blonde had better things to do, things that didn’t involve trying to make her act the way she should have been acting all along.

(And if those were just words Phil had ingrained in her mind she was thinking, she didn’t notice).

“Erin”, Holtzmann replied, giving her best to sound kind and tender after seeing the way the redhead’s eyes were glistening. “No matter what I’m doing or where I am, you will never bother me. Alright? You can come to me when I’m under the shower or even on the toilet. Even though that might be bad for your health. Abby once walked in on me on accident and she claims to this day it made her eyes water and burned off the hairs in her nose.”

She was grinning a little as she spoke, glad she got a reaction out of Erin this time; even if it was one of disbelief. It was clear the physicist didn’t believe a word of what she was saying, and couldn’t understand how Holtzmann could even think she’d want to be interrupted by someone as insignificant as Erin. The engineer just smiled at her, moving over to where Erin was standing. The redhead’s eyes were still glistening with unshed tears, Erin clearly trying (and mostly failing) to gain control over her emotions.

Seeing Erin in this state prompted Holtzmann to ask her if she wanted a hug, her eyes and voice kind and filled with compassion. She didn’t just want to touch Erin, not now she still suspected Erin had negative associations with any sudden movements in her direction. The last thing she wanted to do was scare the physicist off completely. Especially when even now, it seemed like Erin was fighting an inner battle with herself, deciding whether or not to accept Holtz’s offer.

She was more than a little determined to force herself to decline Holtz’s offer. After all, it was incredibly childish of her, the need she felt to be held. She felt like a kid crying after a bad dream, and reminded herself that no one wanted a grown woman acting like a child.

But the she thought back to what Holtzmann had already done for her. How she had treated her with such kindness, even when she _knew_ what pathetic situation Erin had gotten herself in. How she had chased Phil away from her, how she had yelled at him for hurting her, how she said she…

She wasn’t quite sure if she could believe that last part, still. Why would Holtzmann love her? _Her_ , of all people? She wasn’t special. She wasn’t remotely pretty, she was stupid enough to get herself into this mess and too stupid to get herself out, and compared to the blonde engineer she was downright boring and uptight. But that specific memory ignited just a tiny spark of hope in Erin’s chest, which was enough to make her nod quietly, fully expecting Holtzmann to tell her how stupid she was for wanting to be held.

Instead, she felt the blonde’s arms wrap around her, prompting a shudder to run through her as she practically slumped into the embrace.

“I’m not hurting you, am I”, the blonde mumbled to her as she hid her face against the engineer’s shoulder, feeling another onset of tears. Erin shook her head, breaking down in earnest when she felt Holtzmann rub her back with a gentleness she hadn’t experienced from anyone in far too long. A strangled sob escaped her before she could even try to hold it back.

Part of her expected Holtzmann to pull back at the sound, and to tell her that this kind of behaviour wasn’t appropriate for a woman her age. She was a _scientist_ , for God’s sake. An adult. When would she finally grow up? But Holtzmann just held her closer, rubbing her back and whispering to her that it was okay, that she should let it all out.

It only made her cry harder.

“I’m sorry”, she brought out between sobs after a while, “I just… I…”

“It’s okay”, Holtzmann spoke soothingly, briefly wondering how many more times she’d have to say this until Erin would actually believe her. “Please don’t feel like you have to apologize for this. None of this is your fault.”

Her hands slid lower without her fully realizing, coming to rest on Erin’s lower back, causing the physicist to wince. Holtzmann pulled her hands back as if she’d been burned, her eyes wide when the redhead looked up at the unexpected end of the hug and met the engineer’s eyes. Had Holtzmann had enough of her pathetic behaviour already? Erin tried searching the blonde’s eyes for an explanation – not that she deserved one – but found Holtz looking at her rather strangely. The physicist wasn’t quite sure what that meant.

“I’m sorry”, Holtzmann was the one to apologize this time, which made Erin frown. _Apologetic_. That’s how Holtz had looked at her. The fact that she hadn’t recognized that expression should probably worry her more than it currently did.

Holtzmann seemed oblivious to the workings of Erin’s mind, too caught up in the fact that she had probably just hurt Erin; however accidental. “I didn’t realize… Erin, how bad did he…?”

Erin swallowed heavily, and gave a barely perceptible shrug in response, clearly not knowing how to respond. For some reason, Holtzmann seemed worried about her, but Erin suspected that worry would soon turn into pity or something much worse if she learned about the true extent of Erin’s injuries. Or, more accurately; the true extent of how often Erin had been a nuisance to Phil.

With her gaze softening, Holtzmann moved to put her arms around her again, making sure to stay away from her lower back this time, a gesture which had Erin’s breath hitch a little. Holtzmann was purposely staying away from the places that hurt. She actually cared about her. She wanted her to feel okay. And her voice still sounded kind and gentle again when she spoke up once more.

“Can I… see? It’s okay if you don’t want me to. I’ll only look if you’re really comfortable with it, alright?”

From how Erin stiffened in her embrace, Holtzmann could immediately tell that Erin wasn’t all too comfortable with the thought. Knowing Erin, knowing how she’d been acting since Phil got his hands on her, she probably thought Holtz would hate her if she let her know how bad it was. Pulling back just a little, she met Erin’s gaze, looking at her in a way she hoped would convey she wouldn’t think less of the physicist either way.

It seemed to be enough for Erin to agree. Or maybe she only said yes because she didn’t feel like she _could_ say no, Holtzmann belatedly realized, as she saw Erin’s fingers trembling too much to actually undo the buttons on her blouse. “Erin, honey”, Holtzmann fought the urge to grab her hands and stop her, knowing that would only make it worse, “you don’t have to show me if it makes you uncomfortable. It’s okay to say No, I won’t get… I dunno, mad or disappointed or anything.”

She wondered, then, how often she’d been able to say No to Phil. If it had even been allowed, or if he simply had taken what he wanted whenever it had been his fancy. The mere thought made her sick to her stomach all over again, especially when she realized there was no way in Hell she could ever just ask Erin that.

But Erin shook her head, distracting her from those thoughts as her trembling voice reached Holtzmann’s ears. “I want to let you see”, Erin told her, looking determined despite her obvious nerves and fear. In that determined look, Holtz could catch just the tiniest glimpse of the old Erin – the Erin pre-Phil, the most radiant and beautiful woman Holtzmann had ever met – and it made her heart sing. Because it meant that not all was lost. It meant that Erin could come back to her, even if it was going to take a lot of time for her to get there. “I just… you might have to do this, I’m sorry…”

Holtzmann swallowed at that, but nodded, pushing away a few more unwelcome thoughts. She had been dreaming of taking Erin’s blouse off, from the day she had seen her for the first time, but she certainly hadn’t thought she’d have to do it under these circumstances. In those dreams, she hadn’t been taking Erin’s blouse of because the redhead was trembling too much to do it herself, too nervous and scared to show Holtzmann the bruises and wounds she was hiding.

Erin let her hands drop to her sides and just stood there somewhat awkwardly, her mind racing a mile a minute. Because while she wanted Holtzmann to see, because she trusted her, she was still scared. Because what if Holtz saw, and then concluded Erin was too pathetic to waste her time on? What if she realized just how much of a burden Erin could be, if she had caused Phil to do this to her? Because if not even Phil could keep his temper around her, how would Holtzmann ever manage? If Phil was the only one who loved her, and he treated her like this, surely everyone else would treat her even worse, right?

But she tried to push those thoughts away as Holtz worked away at the blouse, slowly unbuttoning it as Erin tried to silence those voices in her head. Because Holtz had been kind to her. She had told Erin she loved her. She had been nothing but gracious to Erin. And Holtz wouldn’t be so cruel as to do all that just so she could hurt her again.

Still, fear was a powerful motivator, and Holtzmann noticed Erin’s breath quickening. Now it weren’t just Erin’s hands trembling; it was all of her, and Holtzmann stopped at once, more than a little worried about the physicist. “Erin?” She asked, trying to catch Erin’s gaze as she pulled her hands back, making sure Erin could see she wasn’t going any further. “Do you want me to stop?”

Her concern only grew when pearls of sweat began appearing on Erin’s brow, and she wondered how close the other woman was to another panic attack. “It’s okay if you do, really. I promise.” She spoke soothingly, hesitantly placing a hand on Erin’s arm. “Just nod if you can’t talk.”

“No”, Erin brought out, in a trembling voice, “I need to do this… Want to…” And there was that determination again, that tiniest bit of defiance that had caused Erin to stop Phil from hitting Holtzmann earlier that day. It made her happier than she could say to know that side of her physicist was still there, however small. “I just… I need a minute…”

Holtzmann nodded, remembering the tea at the same time. The water had begun boiling and had started to cool down again already by the time she returned to the kettle. Luckily, waiting for it to boil again gave her something to do as she waited for Erin to regain her composure.

She made sure to not stare at Erin as she poured the now boiling-again water into the cups she had readied, and just when she put the kettle down again, Erin said “Holtzmann?” in a tiny, insecure voice, prompting her to turn around at once.

She immediately forgot all about the tea, and part of her mind was still functioning rationally enough to point out that now she’d probably learn first-hand what it felt like for Erin when a panic attack made it hard for her to breathe.

While her back had been turned, Erin had unbuttoned her blouse the rest of the way, and had taken it off. She still had her skirt on, and a simple black bra, but the bra wasn’t what took Holtzmann’s breath away.

(Well, not the only thing. She was still only human, and Erin was still beautiful, but right now that wasn’t what she was focusing on).

She had feared that the bruising might be bad, but she hadn’t expected _this._ Both the left and right side of the physicist’s ribcage were practically _covered_ in bruises, ranging from the angry blue and purple of fresh ones to the various hues of green and yellow of older ones. One of her ribs looked bruised, too, and that was another thing; Holtzmann could actually see way too much of the physicist’s ribs, startled as she fully realized how much weight Erin had lost.

“Jesus Christ, Erin”, she brought out in a breathless, uncharacteristically high voice, which made Erin flinch a little in response, her grip on the blouse tightening. Because _of course_ Holtzmann would be shocked by this, by how much Erin had managed to annoy Phil. She was probably just now learning just how terrible Erin could be.

The engineer took in a deep breath before she walked over to where Erin stood, briefly touching her shoulder as she moved around her, taking a look at her back. There was more bruising there – _of course there is,_ she thought to herself somewhat sardonically – right above the redhead’s kidneys. Holtzmann had taken a hit there herself one time, during a bust, and she remembered well how much that had hurt, how it had knocked the breath out of her and how it had hurt for a few days afterwards. To think Erin had been walking around with all that for God only knew how long, not even complaining _once_ …

“Why did you never say anything”, she brought out, her voice trembling as she moved to look Erin in the eyes again. But with the redhead’s gaze fixed to the ground, that was somewhat difficult. “Jesus, Erin… If we had known it’s this bad…”

“It was my fault”, Erin mumbled in response, forcing Holtzmann to struggle once more to hold back her anger, the urge to find Phil and kick his ass from here to next Sunday almost overwhelming, “I made him angry, I embarrassed him…”

“Erin, no”, Holtzmann replied at once, making sure to move slowly as she reached out and took tender hold of Erin’s hand, glad when the physicist didn’t pull back from the touch, “I know that is what he told you, but that’s not true, alright? You’ve got to believe me on this. There is no way him hitting you is your fault, alright? No freaking way. He made the choice to do this to you. _He_ hurt you. It’s his fault and his fault alone.”

“But I—”, Erin started, only to have Holtzmann shake her head at once. She reassured her once more that this wasn’t her fault, feeling it was important to say this, even though she knew that Erin wouldn’t quite believe her; at least not yet. It would take time to cleanse Phil’s poison from her mind, and Holtzmann asked herself if she’d have the skill necessary to do so. She had no doubt that she had the patience – if she had to, she’d tell Erin every day that it was not her fault for a hundred years – but she was no psychiatrist, and she worried that she might do or say the wrong thing, and make everything worse instead of better.

But at least Erin seemed to be done arguing with her. Whether that was because even the tiniest part of her believed Holtzmann, or because she was just scared to make Holtz angry with her, the engineer didn’t know. She vaguely suspected the latter, which hurt her more than she could say, but she tried telling herself that it wasn’t personal. That this was just how Phil had forced Erin to think. Again, it was going to take time for Erin to get better, but she found solace in the fact that Erin had shared this with her. It meant the redhead trusted her, even just a little.

Plus, it seemed like Erin actually _wanted_ to be with her. Out of all ghostbusters, she had latched onto Holtzmann, trusting _her_ to keep her from being alone. And by God, Holtz was going to do everything in her power to prove herself worthy of that trust.

“Oh!” she let out as a thought hit her, Erin looking up at her at the unexpected noise, a bit startled, “I got a salve for stuff like that up in the lab! ‘Cause you know me, medium poofs and all, I got bruises more often than I want to admit. It’s for sport injuries actually, but it works quite well, numbs the pain and everything. Want me to get that for you?”

Erin shook her head, mumbling something about not wanting to be a burden, which Holtzmann supposed she should have seen coming. “Let me rephrase that: I’ve got a salve for those bruises up in the lab, and I wanna help make you feel better. Would you be okay with me getting that for you?”

Erin looked at her in surprise at that, utterly confused as to why Holtzmann would be so nice to her still. The blonde had already done so much for her, yet she _still_ wanted to help Erin. She felt like such a burden to Holtz already; didn’t the engineer understand that Erin wasn’t worthy of her precious time?

But she nodded nonetheless, causing Holtzmann to smile at her. And that alone, Erin supposed, already made it worth it. Because no matter how quickly she expected Holtz’s generosity and kindness to run out, at least this once she had managed to make her smile.

“I’ll be right back.” Holtz beamed at her before she practically bolted out of the kitchen, and Erin could hear her boots thumping on the stairs as she ran up to her lab. She had a moment to fear that Holtzmann would stumble and fall, then the sound of the thumps changed and she exhaled in relief, knowing it meant that Holtzmann had made it to the top of the stairs safely.

She felt quite exposed as she stood there, blouse in hand, but figured that putting it on again now didn’t make any sense. The salve would need to be applied to her ribcage, and possible her back if Holtz was willing to help, and in both cases the blouse would be a hindrance. So, Erin stood there, feeling awkward and exposed. Then, she heard a heavy thump as Holtzmann came sliding down the fireman’s pole and landed on the ground floor, the engineer smiling at her and proudly holding up a blue and white tube of salve, as if she was presenting some sort of trophy.

“Foooouuund it”, she half said, half sung, taking note of how Erin’s lips twitched, as if she was about to smile, “um, do you want me to…?”

“Please”, Erin said, before she could allow herself to overthink it, “if it’s not too much of a bother…”

“Certainly not, cupcake”, Holtzmann replied, smiling at her, that same smile which had always managed to make Erin’s heart flutter before all this happened. And just for a second, Erin smiled back. It was a tiny smile, barely more than a miniscule rising of the corners of her mouth, but it was a smile, and it made the engineer’s heart skip an excited beat.

“Alright”, she said, unscrewing the tube’s cap, “I’ll try to be careful, okay? Tell me if it hurts.”

Erin nodded, watching how Holtzmann squirted a sizeable dollop of the white salve onto her fingers, then knelt down in front of her. The physicist held her breath when the cold stuff touched her rib cage, but Holtzmann was so gentle as she carefully spread the salve that it nearly made Erin cry all over again, the redhead unable to remember when it’d been the last time someone had touched her with such tenderness.

Valiantly, she fought against her tears, Holtzmann’s movements pausing briefly when she noticed Erin’s breath hitch. She said nothing though, but simply kept her focus on her task, finishing at the redhead’s ribcage and moving on to her back.

“There”, she said once she was done, capping the tube again and straightening back up, “All done. We can keep doing that until the bruises got better if you want, okay?”

Erin nodded, thankful that Holtzmann had done this to her, though still not quite understanding why. She tried not to question it too much though, as the engineer handed her the blouse back with a smile. As Erin put it back on, the blonde let out another “Oh!”, prompting the physicist to give her another question look.

“What a dingaling, I almost forgot”, Holtzmann said, reaching into one of her pockets, “I got something you might want… back.”

When she pulled out the seashell necklace, perfectly clean and shiny on the thin golden chain, Erin couldn’t keep herself from gasping, her hand coming up to cover her mouth as her eyes went wide.

“I found it”, Holtzmann explained, noting how Erin’s eyes started to shine suspiciously once again, but figuring this time, the tears were happy ones, “when I looked for my blowtorches. Nice hiding place by the way, but you should know better; you can’t keep The Holtzmann from her fire. Anyway, um… I found that, and I figured you might want it back at some point so… here.”

“Thank you”, Erin brought out in a choked voice. Momentarily, the panic flared again at the thought of taking off the necklace Phil had given her. He had warned her not to lose it _. ‘It had been expensive’_ , he had said, _‘and she certainly wasn’t worth another one’_.

Then she reminded herself that Phil was out of the picture. That she was away from him, that Holtzmann and the others had rescued her from him and had _punched_ him, that they had promised they wouldn’t let him hurt her again. And with that in mind, she took it off, needing a few tries due to how much her hands trembled. She was a little grateful Holtzmann didn’t offer to help this time, knowing she wanted this to be something she did herself. She knew taking off something as silly as a necklace wouldn’t automatically free herself from him, but it was worth a shot, at least symbolically.

When Holtzmann heard the necklace hit the table with an audible _clunk_ , she felt like cheering out loud, smiling from ear to ear instead when Erin took the seashell necklace from her and put it on. It was a small step, she knew, a tiny one, perhaps, but it was a step, and it made her so happy that at least for the moment, all her concerns and worries about Erin were forgotten.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys, it's ForxGood here, with a little update on the fic itself; Dreamshaper has officially written the final scene of the final chapter yesterday, making the fic ALMOST complete. Yours truly has got some more editing to do, but we'll be increasing update speeds, and will now be posting new chapters on both Thursdays AND Mondays. It's been a wild ride for the both of us, writing this. What started in October of last year with just bouncing a few ideas around turned into THIS, and while we feel a little sad that we're done actually writing it, we're both very satisfied with the ending and hope you will be to. In any case, we thank you all for your support; your comments kept us writing, and we can't wait to share the rest of this story with you.


	19. Chapter 19

A short while later, the two had moved back to the couch, teacups in hand now, and had gotten comfortable there. Erin took the first sip of her tea, and when the taste filled her mouth, reminding her of her very favourite season, of falling leaves and apple-cinnamon muffins and pumpkin spice drinks, she found herself smiling, truly smiling, for the first time in weeks.

She allowed herself to revel in the sensation for a few seconds, before she noticed Holtzmann staring at her, her chin propped up on one hand and grinning from ear to ear. She felt embarrassment course through her immediately, blushing and clearing her throat as she put the mug down again. She also wiped at her mouth, just in case she had managed to give herself a sort of tea moustache. Phil had never liked her eating or drinking messily, but then, she figured that Holtzmann probably wouldn’t mind that much, seeing she had no problem with having sauce trickle down her chin whenever she ate those horrible burritos she loved so much.

“What?”, she finally dared to ask, not sure if she wanted to know, but telling herself that Holtzmann wouldn’t do or say anything mean. Or at least if she would, she would have done so already.

The engineer merely shrugged and took a sip of her own cup, eyes sparkling when she replied. “Nothing”, she told the physicist, still smiling at her in that same, adoring way. “I just… I like seeing you smile. Like this. Like you just did now when you tasted that tea.”

Erin felt her blush intensify, staring down into the cup in response, wondering if this was actually fair to Holtzmann. Because here she was, grinning like a fool at tea Holtzmann had made for her, after she had gotten them all into trouble and actually had gotten Holtzmann hurt. She wondered if the engineer blamed her for that. She probably did, which only made Erin wonder more why she was still being treated so kindly by the engineer.

“Erin”, Holtzmann said, immediately having picked up on the shift of the redhead’s mood, “what are you thinking? Please tell me. Let me help.”

“I’m sorry”, Erin mumbled in reply, feeling too ashamed to look Holtzmann in the eye, which only made the engineer worry more.

“For what? Erin, honey… You’ve got to talk to me, okay?”

The worry in Holtz’s voice was enough to make Erin look up at her, feeling sick to her stomach as she saw the by now quite dark, purple and blue bruise which had formed where Phil had hit the engineer. She gingerly reached out to touch it, then pulled her hand back the last moment, telling herself that she was clumsy and might only make it worse. “For causing this. I didn’t even ask how bad it is, I’m a horrible friend…”

“Wow”, Holtzmann gave back, raising an eyebrow as the pieces finally clicked into place. “For an alleged genius, I must have a very bad memory, because I distinctly remember that it was Phil who punched me, not you. So if anyone caused that, it was him. Not you. Erin, honey, I can’t stress this enough; none of this is your fault.”

“Still”, Erin mumbled, glancing at the bruise and wincing at the sight, “does it hurt…?”

“Nah”, Holtzmann lied without missing a beat. It hurt like a bitch, throbbing when she wasn’t talking or smiling and sending flashes of pain through her whole head when she did, but she was not going to make Erin feel even worse by admitting this. The redhead already blamed herself enough as it was. And if Erin could suffer through all those bruises without complaining, this would be a piece of cake for Holtzmann. “I’ve had way worse. Never mind about my bruise.”

“I still feel bad”, Erin told her, taking another doubtful look at the bruise, finding it hard to believe that this didn’t hurt, “I’m sorry…”

“Don’t be”, Holtzmann said, with a pointed look at the cup Erin had picked up again, probably to keep her hands from trembling. “Like I said, not your fault. Hey, your tea is gonna get cold.”

The physicist only seemed to realize now that she still held the cup and took a mechanical sip of it, then put it on the table. Thinking of the bruise had brought what Holtzmann had said before she had pushed Phil back to the front of her mind, and she found she was unable to ignore that any longer. She had to know. If only so Holtzmann would tell her that _of course she hadn’t meant that. How could Erin even think that? Why would she, a brilliant engineer, be in love with someone mediocre like her?_ Because right now, there was part of Erin still hoping that maybe Holtz’s actions meant something more. That maybe, Holtz’s actions meant Phil had been wrong about no one being able to love Erin. And if Phil had been wrong about that, what else could he have been wrong about?

So she had to know, if only so she could properly crush those last few hopeful thoughts in her mind. Because there was very little that was worse than idle hope, and Erin didn’t want to set herself up for that specific brand of heartbreak.

“Holtz”, she started, making the engineer give her a questioning look, “um… What you said… You know, when you punched him… did you… did you mean that?”

“What”, Holtzmann tried to deflect, starting to sweat as she imagined a million unpleasant reactions to the admittance that she had. That she was in love with Erin Gilbert so much it hurt. “That I’d kill him? Yeah if he hadn’t hit back, I might have, haha!”

Her laugh was so obviously fake that Erin noticed at once, giving her a _look_ which reminded her of pre-Phil Erin. It lasted less than a second though, before the redhead deflated visibly. Holtzmann wanted to smack herself, asking herself how she could do this to Erin with the knowledge of how Phil had chipped away her self-esteem more and more during the course of the mess their relationship had been. She had _been there_ when he told her no one would love her, for crying out loud. Would it really be so bad for Erin to know how wrong he was, even if it wouldn’t amount to anything?

“Yeah”, she thus said, her voice soft now, “I meant it. You’re my everything, and I love you. Have for quite a while now.” She sighed, looking at Erin with an apologetic expression. “Feel free to freak out now. I’ll stay away from you if it makes you uncomfortable.”

Erin’s gaze came up again, meeting hers, and Holtzmann found herself surprised when Erin didn’t look freaked out the slightest. And just when she had registered that, the physicist leaned in, closing the small gap between them, and kissed her.

A million thoughts ran through her mind at this. Her first thought was of how soft and hesitant the kiss was, as if Erin expected her to pull back or even push her back any moment. As if she hadn’t been expected to be kissed back. Then, she told herself that this was wrong, that she was taking advantage of Erin’s vulnerable state and that this was predatory and creepy. But God, she had wanted this, had wanted _Erin_ for so long, she couldn’t help herself. She had begun kissing back almost immediately, somehow managing to keep the kiss soft and tender, even though all she wanted to was to put much more passion into it.

When Holtzmann kissed her back, Erin was sure, for a few moments, that she would faint right on the spot. She had expected a few reactions, ranging from the engineer laughing at her and asking her if she was serious, to Holtzmann flinching back or perhaps even pushing her away. Part of her had still believed that Holtzmann just said she had meant it to be nice and polite, a way to take pity on Erin who had been doomed to a life on her own. But here she was, Erin kissing Holtzmann, Holtzmann kissing Erin, and she felt her heart overflow with emotion. Because unlike Phil, whose kisses had been demanding and sometimes oddly harsh, Holtzmann’s kisses were tender and sweet. As if she was savouring every moment she got with Erin. As if Erin actually mattered to her.

 _Holtzmann said she loves me_ , she thought to herself as they slowly pulled apart again, her lips tingling and the engineer’s taste still lingering - an odd mixture of cinnamon, minty toothpaste, and burnt things (and better not dwell on _that_ one, Erin thought to herself). _She said I’m her everything and that she loves me…_

She still didn’t know why, or how, but for once she tried not to give that voice much room. Instead, Erin moved closer to the engineer on the couch, daring herself to snuggle up to her. Holtzmann put both arms around her almost immediately, holding her close, causing Erin to relax against her, feeling oddly at peace despite the circumstances. Holtzmann felt safe, she felt comfortable. She felt like home, somehow, and Erin dared to allow herself to revel in that sensation. To just let herself be, even for just a little while.

Holtzmann, for her part, could feel her heart racing in her chest, asking herself if this truly was a good idea or if it only would make things worse. But then again, she knew full well that there was no way in Hell she could tell Erin that they shouldn’t do this. Not only was she scared to make Erin feel worse; Holtzmann herself wanted this. She wanted Erin, she just loved her too much not to. And she’d always had a masochist streak. If this was what Erin needed from her, if this was all Holtzmann could get from her, she’d take it. She’d take it, and she’d thank whatever deity up there in the sky every day for it.

For a while after the kiss, they just cuddled on the couch, the TV providing some mindless background noise. They didn’t talk about Erin kissing Holtzmann, didn’t specify if they were dating now or if it had been a one time, spur of the moment thing, and Holtzmann was okay with that. Still, it surprised her when Erin leaned up again, kissing her soundly after they had just snuggled in silence for a while.

“I like kissing you”, she mumbled after they had pulled apart again. Much to Holtzmann’s delight, she was blushing a bit, even though the blonde felt a bit bad about Erin’s apparent need to justify herself for what she just had done, “it’s… nice.”

“I like kissing you too, cupcake”, Holtzmann reassured her, happy to see that she got another smile. It was a tiny one, again, _but better than none at all_ , she figured, “you can kiss me anytime. Even when I’m on the…”

“Even when you are on the toilet, I know”, Erin finished for her, then seemed to realize what she had done – interrupt her, finish talking for her – and her eyes briefly widened. She literally cringed back in response to that realization, Holtzmann’s heart breaking all over yet again as she realized what just had happened.

 _She thinks I’m going to hit her,_ Holtzmann thought to herself, fighting the urge to reach out towards Erin, knowing this would only make it worse, _for this harmless little remark, she thinks I’m going to hit her. I’m going to kill this man._

Too late, she realized that, while she had thought of keeping her hands to herself, she had forgotten to keep her anger at Phil from showing through her features. She could see the exact moment Erin picked up on it – Holtzmann figured she had gotten quite good at recognizing anger on someone’s face – as she actually recoiled from Holtzmann.

That alone was enough to make the engineer feel like crying.

“I’m sorry”, Erin said before Holtzmann had the chance to speak up. The small, timid sound of her voice made Holtz’s heart clench up, which gave her reason to wonder if this could actually become dangerous to her health, “I didn’t mean to… I’m sorry.”

“Erin”, Holtzmann gave back, giving her best to sound calm and comforting, glad the anger she felt towards Phil wasn’t seeping into her voice, “Erin. My lovely, sweet Erin. Apple of my eye. You have _nothing_ to apologize for, okay? I don’t care if you interrupt me. I’m not angry at you, I’m angry at this dickwad for doing this to you.”

Erin looked doubtful, and Holtzmann once more fought the urge to reach out too fast. Instead, she asked first if it’d be okay to touch the physicist, and only placed a tender hand on her back once Erin had given a brief, terse nod.

“I will never, _ever_ ”, the engineer started again, making sure to hold Erin’s gaze to let her see how sincere she was, “get angry at you for something as insignificant as interrupting me. Okay? And even if I ever do get angry at you – which frankly, I find quite impossible – I would never. Ever. Hit you. Never. I’d rather cut off my own hand than hurt you like this. Alright?”

“Phil always got angry at me”, Erin mumbled in response, her gaze dropping to her lap where she was nervously kneading the fingers of one hand with those of the other, “Because I messed up so much. Embarrassed him. Talked back to him, I don’t know…”

“He’s the one who messed up, not you”, Holtzmann reassured her, “and _messed up_ doesn’t even begin to cover it. Hell, if I had anything to say, he’d be in jail for what he did to you. Erin, I can’t tell you this often enough, none of this is your fault. Alright?”

Erin just gave a small shrug in response, clearly not believing her, but the engineer figured that this was all she could ask for. Phil had had months to work his poison into her mind, and she knew she wouldn’t be able to get rid of it with just a few sweet words.

“Hey”, she thus said, eager to take Erin’s mind off the thoughts about what a horrible person she was, “It’s almost lunch time. We should see if there’s any leftovers we can eat, or perhaps just skip that step and order something. What do you feel like having?”

“Salad’s fine”, Erin replied automatically, and Holtzmann’s heart clenched up painfully again as she thought to the all too clearly visible ribs she had seen when Erin had taken her blouse off. She morbidly wondered if running stick over the redhead’s ribcage would pronounce sound, like a xylophone, then shrugged these thoughts off, telling herself they had to take one step at a time.

“Alright”, she thus just said, “Personally, I feel more like pizza, but I imagine we can find a restaurant to sate both of us. Want to come look with me?”

Erin nodded, coming to her feet; and the moment she stood, Holtzmann took hold of her hand, smiling when the physicist returned the grasp immediately, looking a bit calmer and less frightened when they made their way to the laptop, a plan to get Erin to eat more than salad without being creepy about it like Phil already forming in Holtzmann’s mind.

The pizza Holtzmann had ordered – to Erin’s surprise not the ungodly combination of pineapple and ham the blonde usually ate, but one which looked much healthier, and had more vegetables than the engineer normally would allow on her pizza – and the salad arrived fairly fast. They sat down on the couch to eat, so they could watch TV as they did so, even if Holtzmann kept complaining that this pizza was probably _much too large for her_ but that she had to struggle on despite that because _“I cannot disrespect the Pizza Gods, Erin.”_

When there were only two slices of her pizza left, Holtzmann started to groan so dramatically that Erin looked at her in shock.

“Oh Tesla save me”, Holtzmann gasped, rubbing her stomach and even opening her belt, “if I eat just one more bite, I’ll explode. Erin, please, you _have_ to help me with this.”

Erin’s first response was to decline, a certain man’s voice asking her if she really wanted to eat that and pointing out how unhealthy this was and that she’d get fat and be even more unattractive. She knew she was mediocre-looking at best, and putting on weight would only make her less attractive. And while Holtz may have told her she loved her now, she was sure that opinion on her could change on a dime.

Holtzmann kept groaning though, and giving her puppy dog eyes as she begged the Pizza Gods to forgive her for this blasphemy. And it was such an incredibly _Holtzmann_ thing to do, that Erin couldn’t help but give in, her old habits of never being able to say no to the engineer’s innocent craziness kicking in again. So she finally took one slice, just to make the engineer stop, telling Holtz that this was really _all_ she could be able to eat, the mere thought of eating something as unhealthy as pizza already making her stomach churn. But she told herself that at least this was a slice that didn’t have so many toppings, and the ones on it were healthy, anyway.

And when she noticed how brightly Holtzmann beamed at her when she picked the food up, she told herself that maybe it didn’t matter. Not if it got the blonde to look that happy. She still held back the urge to roll her eyes at the engineer’s antics – the blonde was still blabbing on about how she appreciated the sacrifice made for the Pizza Gods on her behalf –  not wanting to make Holtzmann angry, before taking a bite of the pizza.

As the taste of cheese and tomato sauce and vegetable exploded in her mouth, in doubled intensity perhaps after the salad, she couldn’t hold back a low moan of pleasure. Holtzmann was grateful for the fact that Erin’s eyes closed in pure delight, as it prevented the redhead from seeing just how brightly she flushed at that sound.

 _Oh Hell that was too hot,_ she thought to herself, staring at the physicist eating the pizza with so much obvious enjoyment that it made her tingly all over. _If she makes that kind of noise in bed… no no Holtz, don’t go there. Way too early for that. But if she does, oh wow._

She swallowed heavily, then hid her face behind her comically large paper cup, slurping coke audibly. Erin barely seemed to notice though, lost in pizza-heaven, and even though she still was flushed at the noise the physicist had made, Holtzmann found herself smiling once more. She was beyond glad that her little plan had worked so well, allowing herself to bask in this little victory even though she knew they still had a long, long way to go.


	20. Chapter 20

A while after they had eaten, Erin was asleep on the couch again, still exhausted after everything she had gone through. Holtzmann had gone back to tinkering, even though she worked somewhat mindlessly, thinking of Erin and what the dickwad had put her through.

She glanced at the sleeping physicist, her heart aching for her. She still looked small and vulnerable, but luckily not as frightened as she had during her previous nap. And at least she had eaten that bit of pizza, something with slightly more calories than the ‘all-lettuce-no-dressing-salads’ she had been eating before.

As her hands moved on their own accord, taking the proton pistol apart and putting it back together, Holtzmann wondered if she shouldn’t have tried to get Erin out of there sooner after all. If part of this was her fault because she had waited for far too long.

_ But you tried,  _ she then reminded herself,  _ you tried to get her out, and they wouldn’t believe you. _

As if these thoughts had somehow been heard by the persons they were about, her phone vibrated in her pocket. She was glad that she’d put it on mute, sure that her obnoxiously loud text alert tone would have woken Erin up otherwise, and pulled the phone out, not quite surprised to see that it had been Patty who had sent the text.

_ Hey babygirl,  _ Patty had written,  _ how’s Erin doing? _

_ Sleeping right now,  _ Holtzmann wrote back, deciding to keep the kisses they had shared to herself for now,  _ but not good. That guy really did a number on her. _

_ She’s gonna be okay,  _ Patty’s response came fairly quickly,  _ we’re gonna help her through this. _

_ Are you?  _ Holtzmann thought to herself somewhat sourly, holding back the urge to type this into her phone,  _ you didn’t even notice what was happening to her. How are you going to help her? _

She heard Erin move on the couch behind her, and quickly informed Patty that the physicist was waking up instead of sending a snippy reply. Just as she tucked her phone back into the pocket, Erin sat up on the couch and yawned adorably. Holtzmann found herself smiling almost automatically, looking at Erin with nothing but fondness as the physicist blinked sleepily, before meeting Holtzmann’s gaze.

“Good… afternoon, I guess”, Holtzmann said, getting up from her seat and moving to where Erin was just changing her position to make room for her. The engineer picked up on the wince when Erin’s feet hit the floor, immediately thinking about what she had noticed of the physicist’s footwear the past days – weeks, even months – almost wincing herself when she realized how much of a strain this certainly had put on the redhead’s feet. She made a mental note to take care of this later, having been told that she gave killer footrubs before.

For now though, she had to make sure that all of Erin’s other needs were taken care of, and thus, she asked her if she wanted something to eat or to drink.

“No thank you”, Erin replied, making Holtz wonder if she was just saying that to be polite and to not be a hassle or if she really didn’t want anything. She shrugged it off for now though, not wanting to be pushy, instead merely nodding as she dropped down onto the couch next to her. She was delighted to find the physicist immediately snuggled up to her, clearly in need of close physical contact.

“You know what”, Holtzmann said once they had gotten comfortable, moving one hand to rub her back tenderly, making sure to stay away from the worst of the bruising, “you’re so tense. And you know what Dr Holtzmann recommends for that?”

“No…”, Erin answered hesitantly, not lifting her head from where it rested on Holtzmann’s shoulder. She repressed the urge to ask her if it was perhaps something radioactive, still scared the joke would land wrongly, causing Holtzmann to hate her. “What is it?”

“A bath.” Holtzmann grinned at her, looking very proud of herself.

“A bath?”, Erin echoed, now raising her head after all so she could look her in the face, “Holtz, I can’t take a bath now, it’s three in the afternoon. That’s no bath time.”

“Says who?” Holtzmann asked, and Erin opened her mouth to respond, only to realize she had no answer. She blushed, and shrugged, her gaze dropping to the floor, only to come up again when Holtzmann tenderly touched her arm.

“You’re so tense”, she repeated, in a kinder tone now, “and I really think a bath would help with that. Who cares what time it is? If you want to take one, go ahead. If you really don’t want to, it’s okay, too.”

“…do we have bubble bath?” Erin asked after a moment, a blush colouring her cheeks again. Baths always had been something she’d enjoyed, but Phil hadn’t been a big fan of them, preferring quick, efficient showers. After he’d nagged her a few times for spending too much time in the tub, she had given up on them altogether. However, Holtz’s suggestion had made her realize just how much she’d missed them. And if the engineer had suggested it, surely it would be okay, right?

“I have something even better”, Holtzmann declared, and Erin found herself getting curious, even smiling a tiny bit when the engineer came to her feet and offered her hand with a flourish. “If you’d follow me, please, so I can show you?”

It delighted her to see Erin smile again, and that feeling only grew when the physicist took hold of the offered hand. She beamed brightly at her as the taller woman’s fingers curled around hers, then the two of them made their way upstairs, Erin appearing quite curious by the time they reached the small bathroom the team had had installed up there. Holtzmann told her that she needed just a second before she started rummaging through one of the cupboards.

“Ha”, she let out after a short while, straightening up proudly, a brown paper bag in her hands now, “knew I kept them in there! And thankfully, neither Abby nor Patty found them. Behold!”

And with that, and quite a bit more drama than perhaps strictly necessary, she presented the bag’s contents to Erin, the physicist unable to hold back a gasp when she realized what it held. It was filled with bath bombs of all sizes and colour, Holtzmann grinning proudly at her reaction as she moved the bag closer for better inspection.

Noticing the look on Erin’s face – the combination of delight and apprehension, Holtzmann quickly spoke up again. “Yes, they’re for you to use. I wouldn’t have offered if I didn’t want you to use them.”

Erin looked at Holtz after she said that, the gratitude in her eyes clear before she returned her attention to the bag. “Oooh”, Erin let out when she spotted one of her favourite ones, one which smelled of apple and cinnamon, “Can I use that one?”

“I’d say use them all, if that is your fancy”, Holtzmann replied, smiling when the physicist fished the bath bomb out of the bag, “but not sure what that would do to the water.”

“Nothing good, I imagine”, Erin said with a little shudder, but smiled a bit again, and the sight made Holtzmann’s heart soar. She smiled back brightly, then told her she’d give her some privacy for the bath. She told her that she’d be within hearing range, though, and that she just could call out to her should she need anything.

Erin nodded, clearly having thrown all qualms about taking a bath at this time of the day aside, at least for now. Holtzmann smiled at her once more, then retreated from the bathroom, making her way to the nearest workbench so she’d hear it in case Erin would call out to her, giving her best to not get lost in her work while Erin soaked in the now sweetly smelling hot water, her muscles relaxing for the first time in months.

As she laid there and waited until the tub had almost filled up, she let her mind wander, thinking back to how it had felt to kiss the engineer. It had been so different to kissing Phil, in so many ways. The engineer had been so sweet, so gentle, even despite everything.

In all honesty, a large part of her had been sure that Holtzmann would react badly in some way. After all, Erin had just herself gotten out of a relationship, and Holtzmann was supposed to be just her friend. She wasn’t meant to be Erin’s rebound pity fuck, or anything else that implied more than friendship. They were friends, that was all there was supposed to be to it. But Erin couldn’t deny she felt safe and secure around Holtzmann. And the way Holtz had kissed her…

_ She said she loves you,  _ she reminded herself, trying, for the first time in months, to drown out the small voice which kept telling her that no one would ever love her the way Phil had – still did, certainly – and that she wasn’t deserving of anyone feeling this way for her.  _ She said I’m her everything. And she kissed me back… _

Still, despite the joy and comfort she felt around Holtzmann, Erin couldn’t push back the nagging feeling that she was possibly hurting Holtz somehow. Holtz loved her,  _ maybe _ , but what about her own feelings? Did she even  _ want _ to know about that? What if Holtz really was just doing this out of pity, just indulging poor little Erin who was in such desperate need of comfort that she ended up making out with her own close friends.

_ But she’s so nice to me… she wouldn’t do all that for me if she’d just pitied me… Right? _

Something went  _ bang  _ in the lab, and Erin flinched, started to sit up, only for Holtzmann to call out “All good!”. She sank back into the hot water again and tried to empty her mind, not wanting to listen to this unpleasant voice in her head anymore, giving her best to not think of anything but how nice this felt as she laid in the tub, the sound of Holtzmann tinkering in the lab a soothing background noise which quickly allowed her to drift off into a light doze.


	21. Chapter 21

A while later, Erin emerged from the bathroom, wrapped up in an oversized towel – she couldn’t quite put her finger on why, but she hadn’t felt much like putting the clothes she’d chosen in the morning on again, and figured that it would be no problem to let Holtzmann see her just wearing a towel. After all, they were friends, right? And Holtz had already seen the bruises; there wasn’t much else for Erin to hide from her.

She questioned this decision, however, when the engineer turned up on hearing her approach and dropped the screwdriver she’d been working with, fumbling to catch it in the last possible moment.

“Um, sorry”, Erin mumbled, feeling her cheeks heat up, “I didn’t mean to startle you…”

“It’s okay”, Holtzmann reassured her at once, mentally making another tally mark for yet another apology from the physicist, “not your fault that I can’t handle the sight of you… like this. Gorgeous.”

“Oh”, Erin let out, not quite sure what else to say to that. She could feel her cheeks heat up even further, which meant her blush was deepening, but she found it hard to believe that Holtzmann really would react so strongly to her in a towel, figuring that she wasn’t that attractive. But on the other hand, the engineer had dropped the tool she’d been holding, and the look on her face now was the exact opposite of repulsion.

She tried to remember the last time Phil had looked at her like this, this expression which only could be described as desire, and couldn’t.

“Thank you”, she added, still not quite sure if she could believe this, but deciding to not question it for now, “but, um, walking around like this wouldn’t be practical… do you have any clothes here I could borrow…?”

“Oh yeah, of course”, Holtzmann gave back, “just a second.” She smiled at Erin, then hurried off.

When she returned a short while later, Erin was oddly touched to find that not only had the engineer found sweatpants for her, but the MIT hoodie, too. She wasn’t sure if Holtzmann knew how much Erin had always loved wearing it – because it was soft and comfortable and smelled like Holtzmann – or if it was just the first thing she’d been able to find, but Erin was grateful nonetheless.

“Thank you”, she said again as she took the clothes, “I’ll, um… I’ll be right back.”

“Meet me downstairs?” Holtzmann suggested, smiling brightly at her, “I have a surprise for you.”

“… Okay?” Erin replied, sounding a little nervous a she did, somehow afraid that whatever Holtzmann had planned, it couldn’t be anything good. As the engineer winked at her, she tried telling herself that certainly, it wouldn’t be something bad, right? After all, with how Holtzmann had been treating her, surely it might just be something else that was meant to make Erin feel better.

Still, she wondered how long Holtzmann would be able to keep this up. How long it would be until she realized what a burden Erin could be. How long until she would prove Phil right, causing Holtzmann to just ditch her.

She tried to push those thought far away as she retreated to the bathroom, quickly changing into the clothes Holtzmann had provided her with there. When she pulled on the hoodie, she stopped for a moment though to bury her nose in the fabric and take a deep breath, for once not caring if this was a weird or creepy thing to do. She realized at once that apparently, Holtzmann hadn’t worn it since she had given it back freshly washed. It mostly smelled of the detergent she had used, but a whiff of Holtzmann’s scent was still there, and it immediately made her feel safe and secure.

Feeling relaxed for the first time in a long while, Erin finally left the bathroom and made her way downstairs, curious what Holtzmann had for her there. Her feet still hurt as she walked, but she figured she’d have to deal with for a while longer, after how long she had been wearing nothing but heels for the past few months. When she arrived downstairs, she found the engineer sitting on the couch, rolling something between her palms, smiling at her the moment she stepped into the room.

“Just a minute”, Holtzmann said as Erin moved to sit next to her, trying to figure out what the blonde had between her hands, “this just needs to warm up a bit further. You up for a foot rub?”

That had Erin coming up short, the physicist looking at Holtzmann as if she’d grown another head, still not used to the apparently unwavering kindness of the engineer. Her initial reaction was to protest, to argue that Holtzmann really didn’t have to do all this for her. Surely the blonde had better things to do with her time than to somehow try and make her feel better.

But one pointed look from Holtzmann – the same one she had gotten earlier, when Holtz had _assured_ her that she wouldn’t have offered if Erin was being a burden – was enough to shut her up, Erin just nodding quietly in response. And again, the beaming smile she got from Holtz almost made that worth it.

“Is that what that thing in your hands is for?”

“Yup”, Holtzmann confirmed, briefly showing her what turned out to be a small bottle of massage oil. “and once it won’t freeze your toes anymore the moment it touches them, we’re all set and ready to go.”

Erin wondered why she had this at the firehouse in the first place, but she decided not to question it. If she went down that particular rabbithole, she’d never come out. Sometimes it was just best not to think too much about what Holtzmann kept around at the firehouse.

“Um, not to be too forward or something, but this might work best if you laid down and put your feet in my lap.”

Nodding, Erin did as Holtzmann had suggested, resting her head on the armrest and placing her feet in the engineer’s lap. The engineer gave her another smile once she had gotten comfortable, then told her to let her know if it’d hurt or was uncomfortable in any way before she opened the small bottle and let some of the oil drip onto her palm.

“Ready?” she then asked, making Erin nod, the physicist feeling nervous and curious at the same time. She couldn’t remember anyone ever having given her a foot rub before, and she wondered if Holtzmann actually knew what she was doing. Again, this was something she decided not to question, instead just taking Holtzmann’s kindness in stride. Besides, she was looking forward to it, figuring that even if the engineer would just rub around a little, it would help with the ache in her feet.

Holtzmann gave her another smile, then started with her right foot, beginning by spreading the – thankfully by now pleasantly warm oil – all over, from her toes to her ankle. Once she deemed that she had done so sufficiently, she started massaging the physicist’s instep. She was careful at first, taking care not to hurt her on accident, and only continued with a bit more strength when Erin let out a mixture of gasp and groan.

Keeping a close eye on her face, ready to stop at the first sign of pain or discomfort, Holtzmann dug her thumb into the arch and used her other hand to carefully bend her toes, but to her relief, all she saw on Erin’s face was a moment of surprise, followed by a look she could only describe as bliss.

“Oh God”, Erin let out before she could stop herself, in a breathless voice which made Holtzmann’s face heat up as she again wondered if the physicist also made this sort of sound when enjoying herself in bed, “that feels so good.”

“Happy to hear, hot stuff”, Holtzmann replied, never stopping the kneading of the physicist’s foot. She could practically see how Erin relaxed more and more with each minute that passed, the engineer happy that her foot rub had this effect on the redhead.

Finally, she deemed the right foot sufficiently rubbed, and moved on the left one, repeating everything she had done there. Erin only relaxed further, letting out another groan when Holtzmann found an especially tender spot and focused on it for a while, until it was so much better that she felt like crying.

“You’re really good at this”, she brought out once she could be sure she wouldn’t burst into tears again, “thank you, that… felt really good. And helped.”

“Good”, Holtzmann smiled, then released her foot, gesturing at the general vicinity of her upper body as she went on, “I can do your shoulders, too, if you want me to? Unless the tub got you all relaxed.”

“I’d like that”, Erin replied before her self-doubt got the better of her. Not a second later, she did begin wondering if Holtzmann didn’t have anything better to do, but the engineer didn’t seem at all put out by the request. In fact, she smiled rather brightly at Erin, something which made the physicist feel a small flutter of _something_ as she looked at the blonde.

“Excellent”. Holtzmann grinned, as Erin carefully pulled her feet back up so the blonde could move. “Oh,” she added, as she motioned for Erin to sit up so she could better reach her shoulders, “not to sound like a dirty lecherous creeper person, but this will be easier if you take off the hoodie…” Seemingly realizing what she’d said, and how it could be interpreted, Holtzmann quickly backtracked. “Um, if you don’t want to do that, it’s okay, too.”

“It’s fine”, Erin reassured her, sensing the engineer’s discomfort and telling herself that she had nothing to hide. She wasn’t quite sure if Holtzmann and she were dating now, and didn’t know how to ask, but the engineer already had seen her in her bra anyway, and had seen the bruises. There was nothing new for Holtzmann to see, and if it helped the engineer, she probably owed her not to be a child about this. She told this to herself over and over as she pulled the hoodie over her head and carefully folded it before putting it aside.

“Alright”, Holtzmann said, reaching for the bottle of oil again, glad that Erin sat with her back to her on the couch so she couldn’t see how her hands trembled. Seeing her react so strongly to the foot rub had done quite the number on the engineer’s heartrate, and having the physicist sit here now in her sweatpants and bra only made that worse.

_ Keep it together, Holtzmann,  _ she scolded herself as she let the oil drip onto her palm again,  _ the last thing she needs now is for you to pounce her like a horny teenager. Even if you kissed, that doesn’t mean she’s even close to ready for more than that. _

Keeping her eyes away from the bruising at the physicist’s lower back, knowing those would only re-ignite her anger at Erin’s ex, Holtzmann focused on her shoulders, startled to feel how tense the muscle there was even after the allegedly relaxing bath Erin had taken. She started carefully at first, but when that neither made the physicist tense up even further, or prompted her to show any other sign of discomfort, Holtzmann got a bit more daring, applying more pressure, stopping at once though when Erin groaned audibly.

“No, keep going”, the redhead said before the engineer had a chance to ask, “this feels so good, please.”

“Your wish is my command, my dear”, Holtz reassured her, applying a bit more pressure again, digging her thumbs into the sore muscle, earning another low, drawn-out groan from the physicist. She could feel herself starting to sweat at those sounds, and even though she had told herself not to do this literally two minutes ago, she wondered again if Erin made such sounds in bed too, feeling her cheeks heat up again at the thought.

She tried to think of unsexy things as she kept the massage going, until Erin’s shoulders weren’t as tense any more as they had been when she had started. Apparently, she hadn’t been all too successful though, as Erin turned to look at her once she had pulled her hands back and immediately looked alarmed.

“Holtz, are you alright?” she asked worriedly, before Holtzmann had the chance to say something, “you’re all… flushed.”

“Fine”, Holtzmann squeaked in a voice decidedly higher than usual, something Erin apparently had noticed too, since she looked alarmed and confused now. Holtzmann wondered what Erin was thinking, even though she was about 98.5% sure it involved the physicist feeling like she had unjustly burdened Holtzmann. This prompted the engineer to clear her throat before she tried again, to her relief sounding a bit more normal at that second try.

“Fine, fine”, she said, clearing her throat once more for good measure, “it’s just… wow…” She breathed out, “you don’t even realize how attractive you are, do you?”

Well, that certainly hadn’t been the answer Erin was expecting. Holtzmann had been correct in her initial assumption that Erin was currently worried sick that she had just been difficult to Holtzmann, pushing her into something she didn’t want to do. Because really, Holtzmann had dozens of things to do that ranked much, much higher than taking care of Erin. But apparently the blonde was experiencing an entirely different kind of discomfort, one which she wasn’t quite sure she knew how to deal with.

“Um”, Erin let out, biting her lower lip afterwards as she wasn’t quite how to respond, and Holtzmann wanted to faint then and there.

“And that is not helping”, she told Erin, fanning herself somewhat theatrically and making sure to put on a bit of a show when she saw her look guilty again, “you’re too gorgeous for me to handle. I might faint. Do you know CPR?”

“I do”, the physicist told her, “but I doubt it will be necessary. Surely you’re exaggerating.”

“The Holtzmann never exaggerates”, Holtzmann replied solemnly, only to smirk when Erin raised an eyebrow, for a moment back to her old self as she responded. “First, that is not even _remotely_ true, and second, The Holtzmann? Is this some new thing?”

“Nah, it’s been around forever. Ask Abby”, the engineer gave back thoughtlessly, realizing too late that mentioning Abby might not have been a good idea considering the way her and Erin’s relationship had suffered over the past months. She regretted it at once, but she knew she wouldn’t be able to take it back. 

Erin had paled visibly at the mention of her best friend’s name, her gaze dropping from Holtzmann’s face and focusing on the couch. Speaking of people who she was burdening… Abby had made it crystal clear how she felt about Erin the last time they spoke, sending her away and telling her in no uncertain terms that she was just wasting everyone’s time.

_ And yet here I am _ , she thought, _keeping Holtzmann from her work. Is that why she’s not here? Or Patty? Do they hate me that much?_

She had begun trembling a little, prompting the engineer to reach out and take Erin’s hand in her own.

“Hey”, the engineer said, giving her best to sound tender and soothing, “you know Abby’s your friend, right? And so is Patty. Things got… bad, for a while, but now you’re away from there, and it’s all going to be fine, I promise.”

In response, Erin, clearly forgetting that she was just in her bra and sweatpants, and forgetting what Holtz had said about her attractiveness, moved closer to Holtzmann, practically snuggling up to her, obviously in need of comfort. Despite her clearly not believing Holtzmann, she seemed to understand that the engineer actually wanted to help her, a certain part of her trusting Holtzmann not to hurt her. And even though Holtzmann was certain Erin would feel and maybe even hear her heart race at this, she put both arms around her and held her, rubbing her back when she felt her tremble, trying to keep her breathing under control as she told herself that now, she first and foremost had to make feel Erin better. Her own needs could be ignored for the time being.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter a day? Chapter a day. Happy Holtzbert week y'all! (feel free to leave extra comments as gratitude they feed my soul)  
> -Forxgood


	22. Chapter 22

Holtzmann had almost expected Erin to wake up screaming at some point during the night, and so, she was quite honestly surprised when she woke up in the next morning and realized the physicist was still fast asleep. Last night, Holtz had initially suggested that she could take the couch, but Erin had given her such a frightened look in response that she had backtracked immediately. In a way, she supposed she should have expected that reaction from Erin, what with how she had been following Holtzmann around like a lost puppy most of yesterday. Clearly, Erin had serious trouble with being left alone.

And so, they had ended up sharing Holtzmann’s bed, Erin spending the night fast asleep in her arms. The redhead was still slumbering now, looking more relaxed than she had during her naps on the couch, the sight warming Holtzmann’s heart.

Difficult as it was, she gave her best to lie still, not wanting to wake Erin up. She told herself she could do this, for Erin. After all the physicist had gone through, the least she could do for her was to not wake her up when she finally was getting some decent sleep.

Apparently though, New York had other plans for the physicist, as just in this moment, a car with a loud siren blaring drove past outside. Erin flinched in her sleep, and let out an adorable little grunting noise as she opened her eyes, momentarily confused as to where she was. Holtzmann could tell the exact moment realization hit her, when the memories of the day at that.

“Hey”, she said softly, not quite sure what to say next to make it better, but figuring that it’d be a good start to remind Erin she was there and that she was safe, “good morning, hot stuff. Slept well?”

It probably was a stupid thing to ask, after all Erin had gone through, but it seemed to do the trick, at least a little bit. Erin was still tense, but relaxed at least a little bit, the realization that she was with Holtzmann apparently enough to calm her down a little. Holtzmann smiled at her as she rubbed her back, eager to help her relax further, and pleased to find the physicist almost instinctively lean into the touch.

“…good morning”, Erin said after having needed a few moments and deep breaths to keep her composure, “okay, I guess…? How about you? Sorry for taking up so much space in your bed…”

“Psh”, the engineer let out, mentally making yet another tally mark for yet another apology, “Nothing to be sorry for. I got to snuggle with you all night, so that was basically the best sleep I’ve had in ages.”

She doubted Erin would believe her, knowing her ex - she refused to even think his name at this point - had done a serious number on the physicist’s self-esteem. But to her delight, Erin at least managed a tiny smile at that; barely noticeable, of course, but it was a smile nonetheless, and Holtzmann absolutely beamed back at her.

She wasn’t quite sure if it’d be okay to kiss the redhead good morning, but found the desire quite hard to withstand, and so, after a moment, gave in to it, leaning down the tiniest bit until her lips barely brushed Erin’s, giving her ample opportunity to pull back, should she not want this. Just in case the kisses of the previous day had been a one-time thing, a sort of fluke brought on by her upset state.

Instead of pulling away though, Erin reached up with one hand, brought it to the back of Holtzmann’s head and pulled her closer, putting a bit more pressure into the kiss. It all remained fairly innocent, but it was enough to have relaxed Erin a bit further by the time Holtzmann pulled back again.

“Best morning in ages, too”, the engineer mumbled dreamily, Erin feeling quite the disbelief at this. Certainly, a brief kiss like that one - and just from her, no less - couldn’t make the morning so great. Before she could ponder this further though, Holtzmann asked if she felt like getting up or if she wanted to snuggle some more, Erin feeling her heart clench up at this simple choice. There had been morning cuddles with Phil, in the very beginning, but not many, and they had stopped fairly quickly, the man telling her he had better things to do than wasting time holding her in bed.

“Getting up is fine”, she mumbled, even though she liked the thought of more snuggling. Holtzmann felt warm and safe, and Erin didn’t really want to lose that feeling. But the guilt and shame had come creeping back into her mind already, and she knew she couldn’t ask Holtzmann to waste her time with her like that.

The engineer nodded, then carefully disentangled herself from Erin, mindful of her bruises, glad when she apparently managed to get up without accidentally hurting the physicist.

“We can have breakfast here, if you like”, she told the redhead as she pulled on the first clean shirt she could find, then hopped into a comfy pair of sweatpants, “or we can go out and get something, whatever you prefer.”

“Here?” Erin half asked, half suggested, painfully aware of the fact that she had no fresh clothing suitable for going out at the firehouse. Apparently, Holtzmann realized this too, looking a bit sheepish as she scratched the back of her head.

“Here it is, then”, she said, instead of commenting on Erin’s lack of clothing, “shower first or after?”

“I… I’d prefer first”, Erin gave back, not quite sure why Holtzmann would let her make all these decisions. Apparently though, the engineer was fine with that, telling her that she could have first shower if she wanted, earning a brief, but grateful nod from the physicist.

While Erin showered, Holtzmann found some clothing for her to wear, fresh sweatpants and one of her oversized t-shirts, not wanting to give her anything which might be too tight and put pressure on the bruising. This time, she mentally could prep herself for towel-clad Erin, but her mouth still went dry and her heartrate picked up speed when Erin finally did emerge as her towel-clad self.

“Gorgeous”, she mumbled before she even realized what she was doing, the physicist’s cheeks colouring slightly. Holtzmann beamed at her, then handed the clothing to her before she went to have a shower as well, doing so with quite a bit colder water than usual, just to get herself under control again.

When she finally decided that her desire for Erin was sufficiently controlled, she emerged from the bathroom, relieved to find the physicist dressed and waiting for her. She looked more attractive than anyone in an old, washed out and oversized shirt should, but Holtzmann told herself quite strictly again to keep it together, smiling brightly at her as she asked if she was ready for breakfast now.

“I still got the potentially radioactive muffin”, she added after Erin had nodded, “we can share that if you like, or I think there’s donuts downstairs. You know, the ones you like, with the jam?”

Erin’s first instinct was to decline, to find something healthier for breakfast, or to just claim she wasn’t even slightly hungry at all. She remembered all too vividly how Phil had looked at her whenever she even so much as  _ mentioned _ having eaten anything unhealthy, his judging gaze and taunting words still clear in her mind.

_ How am I supposed to show you off if you look like Rosie O’Donnell, Erin? Do you really want to look even worse than you already do? You know I’m just looking out for you, babe, I just want you to stay healthy for me. _

Barely realizing that she’d taken hold of Holtzmann’s hand, seeking the comfort of the engineer, Erin suddenly seemed to realize that maybe it would be even worse if she declined. After all, Holtzmann had offered this to her. Wouldn’t she be horribly insulted if she said no?

Erin decided she didn’t want to find out, instead trying to justify to herself that taking just one donut was the least she could do.  _ Holtzmann offered,  _ she reminded herself as they reached the kitchen and the engineer started with the coffee machine,  _ it’d be rude to just say no, she’s been so nice to you… _

She tried justifying maybe needing the extra energy, but quickly scrapped that argument. After all, all she’d done yesterday was lay around and burden Holtzmann. Despite the fact that she still felt exhausted, she also knew she had no reason to feel that way. She was just being lazy, or maybe just crying for attention. Best to just pretend like everything was fine; there was no reason to burden the engineer even more with her troubles.

She watched how Holtzmann got done with the coffee machine, then moved to look through the cupboards while the machine hissed and gurgled. Not long after, the blonde let out a “Ha!” and held up a box in triumph, carrying it over to the desk where Erin had sat down as if it was some sort of trophy.

“Dooonuts”, she practically sang, heart skipping a beat when she earned the tiniest smile from Erin at her antics, “I hope they are not stale. But if they are, I can run out and get some.”

“I’m sure they’ll be fine”, Erin said at once, not liking the thought of Holtzmann leaving her alone at the firehouse at all, even if it’d just be for a short while. The engineer nodded, then put the box down onto the table and moved to check on the coffee, the machine getting done just as Abby and Patty arrived for the day.

The moment the two women set foot in the kitchen, Erin’s gaze dropped from Holtzmann to the surface of the table, and she found it hard to look at them even when Abby said “Good morning” in a kind and friendly tone, the redhead self-consciously reaching up to cover the bruise on her throat, shame and humiliation flaring up at once.

From the corner of her eye, she noted how Holtzmann paused at the coffee machine, then moved to her side, feeling herself relax just the tiniest bit when she felt the engineer’s hand tender on her back, along with a lowly mumbled “It’s okay”. She was aware of Abby and Patty standing there somewhat awkwardly, _but at least_ , she thought to herself, _no one was yelling at her about what she was doing there, or_ _if she’d forgotten that she’d been kicked out._

“We, um, we brought fresh donuts”, Patty said, instead of commenting on why Erin was there in the first place, something the physicist had halfway expected, “so you don’t have to eat those old-ass stale ones.”

As she spoke and cautiously approached the table, part of her fearing that Erin might jump up and bolt, the way a scared deer would, Abby took note of how Holtzmann kept her hand on the redhead’s back, and how, after another moment, Erin reached for her other hand and grasped it quite tightly. The researcher thought to herself though that certainly, her friend was just in need of physical affection right now and that this was all there was to those little displays.

“Thanks, Patty”, Holtzmann said, now rubbing Erin’s back soothingly, “coffee is almost done. I’ll fix you a cup, Erin, if you want me too?”

If Erin was honest, she’d much rather Holtzmann stayed right where she was and keep rubbing her back, but she made herself nod anyway, figuring that Holtzmann wouldn’t be gone from her side for too long. Plus, she had no right to demand the engineer’s attention like that, still figuring the blonde had better things to do with her time. Much to her relief, though, the engineer sat down next to her a short while later, the physicist immediately grasping her hand again beneath the table, where neither Abby, nor Patty could see, the two of them sitting on the opposite side.

Breakfast was held mostly in silence, none of them feeling much like small talk, and all of them figuring that Erin wasn’t quite ready to talk about all she had gone through with all of them. Abby found herself wondering if she had talked to Holtzmann already, but was painfully aware she barely had any right to ask, not after how she had failed to notice what had been happening to Erin the whole time she’d been with Phil.

She knew she had to talk to Erin about this sometime soon, acknowledge how she had failed as a friend and apologize, and she did not look forward to that conversation at all.

For now though, she was content to have breakfast with her friends, and with the knowledge that Erin was out of there. The physicist still looked as if she expected someone to yell at her or even attack her half the time, but having Holtzmann right next to her seemed to calm her considerably, her gaze flickering to the engineer ever so often, as if to reassure herself that she was still there and not going anywhere.

And Erin had a donut, Abby noted, oddly satisfied at the sight of her friend eating the pastry and drinking her coffee (to which Holtz sneakily had added a spoonful of sugar, just in case). She knew it was just a small step, but it was an important one, and as she watched the engineer and her best friend, she told herself that certainly, everything would be fine again soon.


	23. Chapter 23

After breakfast, Holtzmann had retreated up to her lab, and Erin had gone with her, not really surprising Abby and Patty. They both felt bad for their friend, but didn’t talk about her, trying to focus on their work instead, figuring that acting as normal as possible around Erin would help her more than hovering around her the whole time and talking about her behind her back.

In the lab, Holtzmann sat at one of her workbenches, keeping busy with the upgrades to Erin’s proton shotgun. And even though Erin was certain that the engineer could do this on her own, she was sat right next to her, helping her out by holding cables for her and handing her tools. Part of her was completely aware that Holtzmann was asking her to do things she didn’t need any help for, but she glad that she could be somewhat useful, anyway.

“You’ll love this baby once I’m done, cupcake”, Holtzmann said, continuing the practically constant stream of chatter she’d kept up ever since she had come upstairs with Erin, having picked up on how the talking seemed to soothe the redhead, made her look less frightened. “it’s gonna blow those ghosts right to pieces. I just have to figure out how to make sure it doesn’t blow you over with the kickback, too, that is still quite strong.”

She kept on talking as she worked, but after a while, she noticed that Erin wasn’t really listening anymore. Instead, the physicist was watching her hands quite intently now, eyes fixed on her fingers moving over the parts and tools, and even though it was perfectly innocuous, Holtzmann felt her face heat up.

She trailed off, and the sudden silence prompted Erin to snap out of her trance. Her eyes came up from Holtzmann’s hands to meet her eyes, and she appeared nervous -  but at least, to Holtzmann’s relief, for the moment she didn’t look as if she wanted to jump up and run, or as if she feared Holtz would hit her any moment.

“Um, I’m sorry”, the physicist mumbled, doing that thing with her fingers she always did when she was nervous, “I was still listening, I swear, I just… I… I kinda got distracted, watching you. I mean, I… I really like your hands.”

She blushed a bit, and looked away, her fidgeting increasing. Eager to reassure her it was okay, Holtzmann reached out and placed one hand on the physicist’s, glad when Erin’s eyes came up again to meet hers, and even more delighted when the redhead managed a small smile in response to the one on Holtzmann’s face.

“Don’t be sorry, hot stuff”, she told her, “I imagine my babbling can get uninteresting after a while, but as long as you’re enjoying yourself…”

“I am”, Erin reassured her, then found a surprising bit of courage and leaned in for a fairly innocent, but gentle kiss.

Neither of them noticed Abby coming up the stairs, the researcher pausing with her eyes widening as she saw her best friend and the engineer kissing.

Before the whole mess with Phil, she would have been happy for them, she knew. After all, Holtzmann had been pining over Erin since day 1. As it was though, all she could do was worry. What with Erin being in the state she was in, she was probably just in need of comfort, blissfully unaware of what this was doing to Holtzmann, and how this could break the blonde’s heart. Retreating quietly so the two wouldn’t notice her after all, Abby nearly groaned when she realized she had to add another uncomfortable talk to her to do list.

“The two okay up there?” Patty asked her as she came back downstairs, and Abby nearly blurted out that Erin and Holtzmann were kissing in response. She bit the words back though, and just nodded, forcing herself to smile at the historian as she sat down at her desk again.

She wondered if she should try to get Holtzmann alone somewhere, or if that would be too suspicious. Thankfully though, this problem solved itself after a while, as the engineer came downstairs and made a beeline for the kitchen. Since Erin hadn’t come with her this time, Abby decided to take this chance given and hurried after Holtz, tentatively saying her name once she could be sure neither Erin nor Patty were within earshot.

“Yup?” Holtzmann gave back, turning to look at her where she was standing at the fridge, cooled cans of coke in both hands. Abby cleared her throat, and gulped, not quite sure how to start this, then decided she might as well be direct, and put it rather bluntly.

“I, um, I saw you and Erin”, she told the engineer, making her raise an eyebrow, “uh… upstairs. Kissing.”

“Yes”, Holtzmann replied, not even trying to deny it, a slightly warning tone creeping into her voice, “and?”

“Look, I know I’m the last person who should comment on this”, Abby admitted, “but… I’m just worried- and yes, I know it is late to be worried, but Holtz… are you sure this is a good idea? I know you’re head over heels in love with Erin, and I’d be so happy for you if this situation was different, I swear, but… this might not be what Erin really wants, in the long run. She’s vulnerable, in a bad place. Maybe she just needs comfort or… I dunno, I just… I don’t want you to get hurt by this in the end.”

“I’m aware of the bad place Erin is in, thank you”, Holtzmann replied somewhat deadpan, making Abby wince, “and I’m aware of the rest you pointed out. I don’t care. If this is what she needs, I’ll give it to her for as long as she’ll let me. And if one day she realizes it’s not what she wants… _I’m_ not what she wants…” Holtzmann shrugged. “I’ll deal. Simple as that.”

“Holtz”, Abby started, then fell silent as she realized she had no idea what to say. Holtzmann just gave her a brief, oddly sad smile, one which nearly broke Abby’s heart, and all she could do was smile back weakly. She supposed she’d just have to trust Holtzmann knew what she was doing, and prepare herself for the probably inevitable moment where the blonde got her heart broken.

 _All for Erin_ … Abby mused, turning back to her own work. If she had still had any doubts Holtzmann’s feelings for the physicist were just those of a simple crush, this was more than enough to convince her of the contrary. The engineer was hopelessly in love with Erin Gilbert, to the point where she was willing to sacrifice her own happiness just to help her heal.

Abby just hoped this wouldn’t blow up in her friends’ faces.

Neither of them were aware that Erin had come looking for Holtzmann and had heard it all, the redhead retreating to the lab again now before any of them could notice her, her mind racing as she tried to handle what she just had heard.

Holtzmann loved her. Holtzmann had been in love with her for months. And here Erin was, toying with the blonde’s emotions, even after the engineer had treated her with such kindness.

 _Abby was right to worry_ , she realized. She had no _idea_ what she wanted right now ( _comfort, Holtzmann, safety_ ), but odds were that whatever it was, she would end up hurting Holtzmann with it. And after how incredibly kind the engineer had been to her, Erin knew she couldn’t do that to her. _Wouldn’t_ do that to her.

 

 

When Holtzmann came back upstairs with the drinks, Erin was still sitting at the workbench, but appeared oddly distracted. The engineer thought nothing of it at first, figuring that it had to be perfectly normal for Erin to get distracted every now and then, possibly by unpleasant thoughts of Phil and the things he had done to her. She only realized that something was going on when the redhead hadn’t touched her once for almost an hour.

“Hey, you know what”, she said, eager to break the silence which suddenly seemed uncomfortable and stifling, “Abby and Patty are thinking about getting your stuff from Mister Dick’s home today. They’re gonna bring Kevin too – if he shows up – so he doesn’t get any ideas. You’ll have your stuff here then. Pretty awesome, huh?”

Erin just nodded, and for a moment, Holtzmann wasn’t even sure the physicist had actually heard her. She had expected some sort of reaction when she had called Phil “Mister Dick”, but the redhead barely had looked at her, and still wasn’t touching her. What was worse, she was even stiffening up when Holtzmann reached out to touch her, the engineer’s heart cramping up painfully at that reaction.

“Erin”, she began, giving her best to sound calm and caring and not in any way upset or even accusing, “is… is something wrong? Did I do something wrong? You seem different since I went to get us those drinks. Oh no, did Kevin spike the drinks on accident? Cause he certainly didn’t on purpose.”

“I heard what you talked about with Abby”, Erin blurted out in response, Holtzmann’s blood running cold as she couldn’t help but wonder how much Erin had heard exactly, “and… Holtz, Abby is right.”

Of all things Holtzmann had expected to hear from Erin, this wasn’t one of them, the blonde freezing in place as Erin continued.

“I don’t know what I want, not really. I just wanted to feel safe, and I didn’t think, and I’ll end up hurting you if I keep asking this of you. I’m just using you. I’m a horrible person and you shouldn’t…”

It were those final words that finally spurred Holtzmann into movement. Whether or not Erin actually liked her, she was in _no_ position to make any form of judgement on that right now. Not when Phil’s poison was still so prominent in her words and actions, not while she still thought of herself as not even worthy of basic friendship from anyone.

Erin’s breath quickened and she started to tremble, signs Holtzmann could read well by now. Not wanting her to end up with another panic attack, the engineer grasped both her hands, wanting to hug her, but not sure if it would help, once more making sure to sound calming and tender as she replied.

“You’re as far from a horrible person as anyone can be, Erin, and you are not just using me”, she told her, squeezing her hands tenderly, “hey, I knew what I was getting into when I kissed you back yesterday. Okay? I just want you to be happy, and if you’re happy the way things are now, with us; great, just perfect. If one day, you’ll be happy when I’m not around you anymore, then I’ll stay away from you. Okay? I’m perfectly aware this might happen, and I don’t mind it. I just want you to be happy. And if I can help with that, if I can make you happy…” Holtzmann laughed. “Well, there we go, I’ll do what makes you happy.”

Erin had calmed down during her little speech, to her great relief, and didn’t appear on the verge of a panic attack anymore. Her relief didn’t last long though – as all at once, Erin burst into tears, sobbing so violently that she could barely breathe.

“Erin, no, cupcake, muffin”, Holtzmann panicked a bit, pulling her into an embrace now after all, her panic subsiding a bit when the physicist buried her face in her shoulder, even though she still was crying, “Erin, sweet lovely Erin, it’s okay, it really is, don’t…”

She cut herself off before she could tell her not to cry, suddenly wondering if Phil had said to her – in a much less caring tone – and not wanting to sound like that man. Erin just kept crying for a little longer, until she finally could talk again, still interrupting herself with sobs though.

“I’m sorry”, she brought out, face still hidden against Holtzmann’s shoulder, the engineer rubbing her back soothingly in response, “it’s just… God, I don’t deserve this, I don’t deserve you, any of this…”

“Honey, no”, Holtzmann gave back at once, still rubbing her back, “you deserve all of that and so much more. You deserve to be happy, alright? I know he told you that you don’t, and who knows what else, but he was wrong. Okay? He was wrong. You deserve to be happy, you deserve to be loved and I love you…”

The words were out before she could stop herself, but Holtzmann figured that she wasn’t telling Erin anything new, and held back the urge to smack herself. In response, Erin quieted, then looked up at her, eyes still swimming with tears, but full of surprise and wonder now, the expression breaking Holtzmann’s heart.

“Yes”, she said before Erin had the chance to speak up, “I meant that, Abby was right when she said I’m head over heels for you. I love you, I mean it, he lied when he said no one ever would, because I do. I love you.”

Erin just slumped against her once more in response, her crying not so violent anymore, but tears still trickling down her cheeks. Holding her close, Holtzmann kept rubbing her back, not quite sure what to say, but figuring she had to say _something_ to make this better.

“I don’t even know what I feel or want”, Erin whimpered into her shoulder before she could come up with something, and Holtz wanted to smack herself for putting this kind of pressure on the physicist with her words. She hurried to remedy that mistake, giving her best to sound soothing again as she replied. “And that’s okay. You don’t have to know that right now, or say anything back to me or whatever. This is about you getting better, alright? Not about me.”

“I just… I don’t want to hurt you”, Erin told her, the engineer feeling a bit relieved when she raised her head again and looked at her, and the flow of tears was ceasing, “you’ve been so wonderful to me ever since this whole mess started… You still are, and I might end up repaying you for this by hurting you, I…”

“You don’t have to repay me for anything”, Holtzmann quickly corrected that assumption, still rubbing the other woman’s back, “and, like I said, I knew what I was getting into. Don’t worry about me, okay? Just focus on getting better.”

“Okay”, Erin mumbled, not wanting to argue about this with the engineer, but still looking up at her, tears in her eyes. “But if you feel you can’t do this anymore… If you want out… You have to tell me. Please promise me that, I don’t want to hurt you, I…”

“I promise”, Holtzmann reassured her at once, even though she couldn’t imagine ever wanting out of this relationship, or whatever it was, no matter how messed up it might be, “if you want me to promise that, okay, I promise. I just want you to get better.”

In response, Erin snuggled up to her again, to the engineer’s relief relaxing slightly in her embrace. She kept rubbing her back, mumbling “It’s gonna be okay” into her ear, briefly closing her eyes and inhaling her scent as she felt Erin wrap both arms around her, hoping that things wouldn’t have to get worse once more before they could get better.


	24. Chapter 24

For the rest of the time until lunch, Erin stayed in the upstairs lab with Holtzmann, helping her work as much as she could. She wasn’t sure if she should be relieved or concerned that Abby and Patty stayed downstairs, unable to wonder if perhaps, they simply couldn’t look at her, too filled with contempt at her for letting herself get into such a situation.

_ And for causing all this trouble,  _ she thought to herself as she watched Holtzmann work, her gaze flickering to the engineer’s face, the bruise Phil’s punch had left there an ugly blue and purple by now,  _ Holtz might not blame you for this happening to her, but what if they do? This could have ended so much worse, he could have broken her nose or hurt her really bad otherwise… And Abby already worries I’ll end up hurting Holtzmann. Undoubtedly Patty thinks the same thing, or maybe she thinks I’m stupid for letting Phil go... _

“Hey Erin?” Holtzmann distracted her from this destructive train of thought, having picked up on how her breathing had quickened and how tense she had gotten, but not asking her what was wrong, deciding it might be better to simply distract her, “can you hold this here for a minute?”

“Sure”, Erin mumbled, letting it happen that Holtzmann adjusted her hands exactly the way she needed them, relaxing a bit at the engineer’s tender touch. Holtzmann smiled at her, then carefully went to work with a ridiculously tiny screwdriver, talking all the while again as she did so, eager to keep Erin occupied and her mind away from dark thoughts.

“I’m the luckiest engineer in all of New York. Nah, all the world”, she told the physicist, “to have such an awesome helper by my side. Bet no other engineer has that. And they’d be stumped at this point, ‘cause one would need four hands or more to do this alone.”

“I’m sure you could have figured something out to do this on your own”, Erin murmured, finding it hard to accept that praise, but feeling her cheeks heat up nonetheless. Holtzmann shook her head with fervour, sounding so serious and solemn when she replied that Erin was a bit taken aback.

“No way”, Holtzmann told her, shaking her head again for emphasis, “I would have made it go poof. And it might have ended in a big poof this time, not medium sized!”

“If you say so”, Erin decided not to talk back this time. And while Holtzmann still tried to figure out if she had done so because she was afraid the engineer might hit her otherwise, she reached for one of her tools with one hand, just a bit too fast and just a bit too close to Erin’s face, her heart breaking when the physicist flinched back visibly.

She had a moment to wonder if she should address this in any way, or just ignore it. Then, Erin’s gaze dropped to the floor, and she mumbled “I’m sorry”, sounding as if she was on the verge of tears again, the engineer’s heart breaking all over again.

“Not your fault, cupcake”, Holtzmann reassured her at once, wondering, somewhat morbidly, how many more times she’d have to say these words. Again, she felt angry at Erin’s ex for doing this to her, for turning the badass, vibrant scientist she’d fallen in love with into this frightened, traumatized woman who viewed herself as the most pathetic, unlovable thing on the planet.

“I’m the one who should apologize”, she added, her heart clenching up yet again at the doubtful look Erin gave her –  _ of course,  _ she thought to herself,  _ he made her believe that she’s the only one who ever did anything wrong _ , “I know what he… did to you, so I shouldn’t… move so fast towards you. I’m sorry.”

“Guys?” Abby’s voice came from the stairwell before Erin could comment on this apology, her disbelief apparent in her eyes though, “um, we’re ordering lunch. Chinese. You guys want to…?”

“You up for Chinese, cupcake?” Holtzmann asked, smiling, somewhat glad for the distraction. Erin looked doubtful for another moment, certainly thinking of the donut she’d eaten for breakfast. It came as no surprise that she mumbled something about not being hungry, but it still hurt, and this time, Abby picked up on it too, a brief flash of hurt on her face as she looked at her friend.

“Alright”, she said though, thankfully not trying to argue, much to Holtzmann’s relief. She wasn’t sure what having another fight with her best friend would have done to Erin, “Holtz?”

“That chicken I like”, Holtzmann gave back, briefly confusing Abby – she never ordered chicken, usually, she went with fried noodles or beef – until the researcher took note of the imploring look Holtzmann was giving her, and realized what she was aiming for. Holtzmann didn’t want that chicken she liked, because that didn’t exist; she wanted the chicken  _ Erin  _ liked. For a moment, Abby felt like pulling her into a bone-crushing hug, immensely grateful for how Holtzmann was taking care of her friend; an area in which she herself had failed hopelessly over these past months. She fought down this impulse, though, instead nodding and smiling at the two as she let them know she’d get them as soon as the food was there.

Holtzmann nodded as well, while Erin still had trouble with looking at Abby. The researcher gave her friend another worried look, then retreated, Erin speaking up the moment she was out of earshot.

“If I mess this up”, the physicist spoke quietly, prompting Holtzmann to look at her, “and hurt you, she’ll hate me all over again…”

“She never hated you to begin with”, the engineer gave back at once, making sure to reach out slowly now as she placed one hand on Erin’s back, “and she won’t hate you no matter what happens between us. I told her, I knew what I was getting into when we started this, anything which happens is between you and me.”

Again, Erin looked doubtful, but didn’t talk back. Holtzmann wondered if she wanted to, but didn’t dare to, and pulled her into a gentle embrace once more, holding her close and rubbing her back, feeling a bit better when Erin relaxed noticeably in her arms, even though she was perfectly aware that they still had a long way to go.

During lunch, Holtzmann once more made a show of not being able to finish her food, and practically begged Erin to eat the quarter she’d left over. And even though she felt bad about it, especially after she’d had the donut for breakfast, Erin ate the bit Holtzmann had left over. Both Patty and Abby, unlike Erin, realized at once what it was the engineer was doing, but both were smart enough to comment on it, just exchanging a knowing glance as Erin ate.

“Um, Erin”, Abby started once they all had finished eating, “we’re gonna go and get your stuff, alright? Um, do you have the key to his place?”

She had made a point of not calling it “your place”, and wondered if Erin had noticed. The physicist gave a brief nod, then mumbled “in my bag”, and Abby went to get it, Holtzmann shaking her head at once when Erin looked at her and asked if she would go with them, too.

“I’ll stay here with you, cupcake”, she then said, and from the grateful look Erin gave her in reply, it became clear that this was exactly what the physicist had been hoping for. Holtzmann smiled back at her, briefly touching her hand just as Abby returned with the key and let them know that Patty and she would head out now.

“Call me in case anything… happens”, Holtzmann said, noticing how Erin stiffened next to her. Phil already had shown that he had no qualms hitting her friends, and she didn’t want to imagine what Abby and Patty might think of her, what they might say to her, should he end up attacking them, as well.

“We’ll bring Kevin”, Abby told the engineer, with a brief glance at Erin, the way the physicist had paled and gone stiff showing that she was thinking something very unpleasant, “that should keep him from trying anything. If he is even home, that is. He should be at work, right Erin?”

At this, Erin gave another brief nod, even though she wasn’t so sure. She hadn’t really seen if Holtzmann had done any actual damage when she had rained blows down on the man, but if she had, Phil certainly hadn’t gone to work that day.

“He should be”, she thus said, swallowing, feeling as if she was betraying him somehow with her next words, but also scared Abby and Patty would hurt her if it turned out she was wrong about Phil’s whereabouts, “but… um… if Holtzmann… visibly hurt him, he might not have gone. I don’t know. Just… Take care?”

“He won’t dare try anything if Kevin is there”, Patty reassured her, “especially since he doesn’t know that Kev is just a big puppy.”

“Mike Hat was a puppy when I got him”, Kevin commented, making Erin briefly wonder when exactly he had come in, “and where am I going? Oh! Am I going on a bust with you?”

“Sort of”, Abby replied, “I’ll explain on the way, alright? Come on, let’s go.”

Enthusiastically, Kevin nodded, smiling brightly. Abby wondered if he’d still smile like that once she’d explained to him that Phil was a bad guy who had hurt both Holtz and Erin, and asked herself if this might be the first time they’d see him actually angry, knowing how much he cared for all of them.

“Okay, Kev”, she started once they were in Ecto-1, having decided to take the hearse even though it wasn’t Ghostbusting business, figuring that they would need the room for all of Erin’s stuff, “we’re going to the place where Erin used to live and we’ll get her things okay? Her ex might be there - you know, the guy named Phil - and he’s a bad guy. He hurt Erin and Holtz, so I want you to show off all your muscle when we are there, okay?”

“Sure”, Kevin replied, frowning, “so Phil did that to Holtz’ face? Why would he do that?”

“He’s a bad man”, Patty gave back, figuring that the concept of domestic abuse might break the poor man’s brain. Apparently he bought that though, just nodded and got comfortable in the back of the car, Abby glad to have him along, but a bit miffed by it at the same time. She was eager to get some of her concerns about Erin off her chest, and wanted to talk to Patty, knowing the historian had to feel just as bad, but not wanting to bring it up with Kevin right there where he could hear every word they’d say.

“You know”, Patty said, distracting her from these ponderings, “part of me hopes he’s home so I can give him a piece of my mind. Treating Erin like this.”

“Same”, Abby agreed, frowning as she thought back to how Erin had looked, standing there beside him, how small and hollow and tired her friend had appeared, and to the bruise she had seen when Holtzmann had taken off the scarf, angry at Phil and at herself for never noticing a thing all over again.

In the backseat, Kevin frowned, but didn’t say anything. The two women fell silent as well, Patty only saying “okay, let’s do this” once they had arrived at the apartment building and she’d parked the car, earning a brief nod from the researcher.

Together, the three of them made their way to the apartment number Erin had given them, empty boxes for the physicist’s things in hand, and Abby unlocked the door. As they entered, Phil came out of the living room, possibly to see if it was Erin actually coming back, and both Abby and Patty felt darkly satisfied when they saw his black eye and swollen lip.

“We’re here for Erin’s stuff”, Abby said, not bothering with a greeting, while Kevin gave his best to look muscular and strong behind her, “make this easy for yourself and don’t try to give us any trouble.”

“Go ahead”, Phil replied, with a dismissive wave of his hand, “we all know this is just temporary anyway. She’ll come back to me.”

“No she won’t”, Patty replied, while Abby just glared, dismissing the man afterwards and looking at her friend, “I’ll go get her clothes, you do the books and stuff?”

“Sure”, Abby gave back, glaring hard at Phil afterwards, her glare only intensifying when she asked where Erin’s books where and he pointed out just a few meagre volumes, nothing compared to the collection Abby knew Erin had had.

“Where’s the rest?” she demanded as she packed the few which were Erin’s into her box, “she had more than that, I know she did. If you’re lying, Kevin is gonna break you in half.”

Kevin nodded, giving his best to look menacing, but Phil just shook his head, not appearing frightened the slightest, even though Kevin probably could have broken him in half literally, had he put his mind to it.

“That’s all she brought”, he said, shrugging, “I had her toss out the books unfitting for a scientist her age, along with a bunch of other stuff. Way too much stuff, actually. I wonder how she didn’t end up a hoarder without me.”

Abby wanted to smack him, especially when she saw that Ghosts from our Past and A Glimpse Into The Unknown were both missing. She settled for a verbal jab instead, giving him a smile she hoped was cruel as she gestured vaguely at his face.

“So tell me, Phil”, she said conversationally, while packing up the few science books he’d let Erin keep, “how did it feel to be on the receiving end for once? Holtzmann got a few good ones in, didn’t she? But unlike her, you always avoided Erin’s face when you hit her, huh?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about”, Phil apparently had decided that playing dumb was a good idea, just for Patty to hear as she emerged from the bedroom, her box filled with clothing, but far from as overflowing as Abby had expected it to.

“Don’t play dumb with us, dude”, the historian said, giving the man a hard look, “we’ve seen the bruise on her neck, and I highly doubt it’s the only one.”

“Well, she asked for it”, Phil replied, shrugging again, either not noticing or not caring about the anger which flared up in the eyes of both women, “you should know how aggravating she can be. Especially you, Dr Yates. She’s left you before, hasn’t she? And she’ll leave again, to come crawling back to me.”

“In your dreams, man”, Patty replied with a shake of her head, while Abby decided it’d be safer to go to the bathroom and pack up Erin’s things there, suddenly imagining all too clearly how she hit Phil over the head with the books she had packed up, “she’s away from you for good. God, and to think I rooted for the two of you when this whole shit started.”

“You’re smarter than all these women with their degrees, then”, Phil replied, smirking at the look she shot him, “and  _ please _ , deep inside, you know she’ll come back. That dyke won’t be enough for her in the long run. She needs a real man and she knows that.”

Patty frowned at that, briefly wondering why he’d think that apparently, Erin had something going on with Holtzmann now. She shrugged it off though, giving him a toothy smile instead, one which clearly unsettled him, since he stopped looking smug for the first time since they had arrived.

“Speaking of Holtzy”, Patty said in a pleasant tone, “you better hope neither Abby nor I feel like telling her all the shit you just said. That girl’s the textbook definition of mad scientist; she’ll blow your car up.”

“I got her toiletries”, Abby came back before Phil could react to that, “are those all her clothes? That’s so little stuff, Phil, where’s the rest?”

“That’s all”, Phil shrugged, “I told you, I had her get rid of the stuff she didn’t need or use anymore.”

Abby gave him another hard look, but he held her gaze calmly, making it clear he wasn’t lying. Again, she felt like punching him, or perhaps hitting him with the books, but fought the urge, even though it only grew when she realized Erin’s awards and trophies were nowhere to be seen.

She knew though that, if she asked him if he’d thrown them out, or had make her throw them out, and he’d say yes, she’d end up beating him up after all. And so she didn’t inquire, but just said “let’s go” to Patty, tossing the key to the floor at Phil’s feet before she turned and marched off without another word, Patty and Kevin following suit, none of them looking back.


	25. Chapter 25

When they arrived back at the firehouse, they found Holtzmann and Erin on the couch, the physicist curled up against the engineer, one of Holtzmann’s arms around Erin’s shoulders, almost absent-mindedly rubbing her upper arm and shoulder as they watched a documentary on TV. Upon their return though, Holtzmann immediately switched off the TV and sat up all excited, Abby not missing the brief flash of disappointment on Erin’s face when this ended the close physical contact.

She still wasn’t sure what to think of this, but she could tell that Holtzmann had been right when she had said that this was what Erin needed right now, and she wondered how anyone could be as willing to have their heart broken for someone else as Holtzmann had shown to be.

“You guys need help carrying in the rest?” Holtzmann wanted to know, gesturing at the boxes Abby and Patty were carrying. She noticed the look the two women exchanged, then made note of Kevin’s empty hands, and frowned, her frown deepening when Abby responded in a soft and caring voice, eager to not make Erin think that this was in any way her fault.

“There is no rest, Holtz”, she let the blonde know, “this is it.”

“What do you mean, this is it”, Holtzmann demanded to know, from the corner of her eye noticing how Erin’s gaze dropped down onto the floor, a clear sign that she was uncomfortable, “that’s just two boxes! That can’t be all!”

“It is”, Erin mumbled from behind her, prompting her to turn and stare at her in disbelief, “I threw out a lot when I moved in with him. Stuff I didn’t need.”

“But, but”, Holtzmann started, peering at the stuff in the boxes, “Erin! That’s so little! And the awards and diplomas and all, did he make you throw those out, too?! Oh I’ll blow up that shitheel’s car I swear to Tesla…”

“Called it”, Patty commented, but before Holtzmann could question that, she noticed how Erin had stiffened up, and averted her eyes now. Her breathing had quickened as well, her whole posture showing how uncomfortable she was.

“Erin?” she said, slowly lowering herself onto the couch next to her and placing one hand on her back, “cupcake? What is it?”

“…he didn’t”, Erin whispered in response, so softly that Holtzmann had to lean closer to hear her, “throw them out, I mean. I hid them.” Almost immediately after she’d said those words, she burst into tears, burying her head in Holtzmann’s shoulder. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry I lied. I’ll throw it out, I promise, please don’t be mad…”

Holtzmann’s heart broke as she realized what exactly was happening. Erin had done the only right thing when she had moved in with Phil, and had hid the things she’d been eager to keep. And now, after months of his abuse and the way he had chipped away her self-esteem, she felt as if she had done something wrong, instead of something good and smart.

“Erin”, she hurriedly said, eager to make her feel better. Even though Erin was crying and clearly terrified, Holtzmann had to admit she was somewhat happy about this as well. After all, Erin had shown by doing this that not all of her had been broken, that there still was some of the old Erin left. And on those bits and pieces, no matter how small they were, Holtzmann would rebuild her to the person she had been.

“Erin, muffin, cupcake, no”, she went on, rubbing her back, “you did a good thing. A great thing, actually. That was so smart and brave. Did you hide it here? Shall we get it for you?”

Erin nodded slowly, wiping at her eyes, feeling bad for crying in front of them again – _ God, they had to think she was so weak and pathetic _ – only to end up surprised a second later when Holtzmann put both arms around her and, after a happy cry of “That’s my girl!” gave her a big smooch on the cheek.

Patty raised an eyebrow at the display of affection, then shrugged it off as typical Holtzy behaviour.

Erin could only sit there, completely stunned, the rush of warmth and affection so foreign in combination with those words falling from Holtzmann’s lips. After all, Phil had used those words too, the phrase “That’s my girl” being spoken whenever Erin had done something he approved of. But the words had always sounded weird to her, nothing like the way they sounded when Holtzmann had just said them.

She didn’t have a lot of time to focus on those thoughts, though, Holtzmann bouncing on the couch next to her like an excited puppy. “Where is it”, Holtzmann wanted to know, making Erin bounce a bit too since her arms were still around her, “where, where? Tell me and I’ll get it. Is it where you hid my blowtorches?”

“No”, Erin mumbled, a bit stumped by how happy Holtzmann seemed to be about what she had done. And Abby and Patty were smiling, too, she noticed, which only made this weirder, Holtzmann letting out an audible gasp at her brief answer.

“Whaaaaaaaat”, she then said, eyes going wide behind her yellow glasses, “you have a hiding place The Holtzmann doesn’t know about? Dr Erin Gilbert! I am shocked!”

At hearing Holtz refer to herself as The Holtzmann yet again, Erin found herself smiling, just the tiniest bit, but enough to let the engineer notice. Holtzmann beamed back at her, asking again where the “super-secret, super-awesome hiding place The Holtzmann knew nothing about” was.

When Erin revealed that it was beneath a loose floorboard next to her upstairs desk, she got bounced again moments later as the blonde practically shot up from the couch, rushing up to their shared second floor office space.

Patty followed a moment later, just in case Holtzmann would need help carrying the stuff, leaving only Erin and Abby downstairs, since Kevin had wandered off God knew where again. Feeling awkward at suddenly being alone in the room with Erin, Abby moved to sit next to her, handing her a tissue she’d found in her pocket and giving her a hopefully calming smile.

“Holtz is right, you know”, she said, just to break the uncomfortable silence before it could fully form, while Erin wiped at her eyes, “you did a good thing when you hid the stuff from him. He had no right to throw out all these things. I thought he was hiding stuff from us when we went to get it!”

Erin just shrugged, not sure how to reply. She could hear some thumping from upstairs, showing that Holtzmann and Patty had found the hiding place, and tensed up, still feeling that she had done something wrong. Abby tentatively reached out and touched her back in response, rubbing it much the way Holtzmann had done when it was apparent Erin didn’t react negatively to the brief contact.

She wondered if she should say something, tell Erin how sorry was that she had failed her so badly as a friend. Before she could find the words though, Holtzmann came thumping down the stairs carrying a cardboard box much like the one Erin had used when she’d been fired from Columbia, Patty right behind her, Abby raising an eyebrow when she noticed that Holtzmann was happily chewing away on what she assumed to be a Pringle.

“When did she have time to get Pringles”, the researcher demanded to know, making Patty smirk as she told her that a can of them had been hidden in the box, along with Erin’s things. Holtzmann winked at Erin, putting the can of Pringles onto the desk before she lowered the box down next to it, rubbing her hands gleefully afterwards, as if she was about to unpack Christmas presents and not things Erin had hidden from her abusive ex.

“Okay, let’s see what we got here”, she stated, gingerly lifting the first framed document out of the box and inspecting it, “ooh, Rising Star Award! Erin, my little rising star.”

She beamed at the physicist, who somehow managed a weak smile in return, even though she still felt as if she had done something wrong when she had hidden all of this. And when Holtzmann pulled the Female Physicist of the Year award she had received a few years ago out next, she felt even more pathetic than she already had, asking herself how she could have gone from being this accomplished scientist to the anxious, useless mess she was now.

Holtzmann noticed as much, simply smooching Erin on the cheek again and telling her how incredibly  _ proud _ she was of her. “I mean damn, Erin, I knew you were a brilliant badass scientist, but I had no idea you were  _ this _ brilliant! Look at us, actually having a female physicist of the year in our midst!”

The books were next, Ghosts from our Past and A Glimpse Into The Unknown, with Abby looking as if she was close to tearing up when she saw them. Because Erin had hid them. Erin had considered the books important enough to hide, undoubtedly risking Phil’s anger by doing so. And Abby had thought Erin had just wanted to leave her again.

She felt well and truly awful, wiping away a tear as she took one of the books from the table, looking at the picture of her and Erin on the back cover.

The others seemed to notice how upset she was, pausing the unpacking of the box to look at her with concerned eyes. To no one’s surprise, Erin had stiffened up again, looking at Abby with scared eyes.

“I’m sorry…” She mumbled, which only served to make Abby cry more. “I know you don’t want me here anymore. I can throw them out if you-” But Abby interrupted her, wrapping her arms around Erin as she cried.

“I’m  _ so _ sorry, Erin.” She sobbed, the physicist freezing up again in her arms. “I should have noticed, I should have  _ done _ something. And I never should have yelled at you like that. I don’t want you gone, I don’t want you to leave. You’re my best friend.”

By now, Erin had also begun crying, allowing herself to relax a little in Abby’s embrace. “I thought you hated me…” She mumbled, still not entirely sure what to do with this information. She didn’t think Abby had anything to feel sorry for. After all,  _ Erin _ had been the one who’d gotten herself into this situation, who had been too weak to get herself out, who had hurt Abby in the process. But here her friend was, apologizing to  _ her _ . It all felt a little upside down.

“I never hated you, Erin.” Abby told her, pulling back to look at the redhead. “I was an idiot. I thought you were just leaving me again. That you were going to go back to your prestigious universities and leave me behind again.”

Erin’s eyes widened at that, absolutely shocked that she’d apparently made Abby think that. “Abby, no!” She protested. “It wasn’t-”

“I know that now.” The researcher interrupted her, Erin immediately shutting up and looking back at her feet again. In her own haze of pain and hurt, Abby didn’t seem to notice, simply trying to look Erin in the eye again. “And I’m so,  _ so _ sorry for letting this happen. I’ve been a terrible person. Could you please forgive me?”

With how Abby was still crying, and how Erin still didn’t believe her friend had done anything wrong, she just nodded, the two old friends hugging again as Holtzmann and Patty looked on. The two shared a knowing smile, glad to see the duo reunited again.

While Abby and Erin were hugging it out, Holtzmann returned her attention to the box with Erin’s stuff, finding a few framed photos of the Ghostbusters next. Holtzmann immediately decided that she’d put them up on the walls where they belonged as she lined them up on the table, feeling her heart warm at the thought that Erin had thought her memories of the four of them were important enough for her to keep. Even if the motivation had just been pure friendship, it made Holtzmann feel special to know that Erin thought of them all as family, at least.

Her degrees were next, as well as another award she’d received for her work. And then, at the very bottom of the box, Holtzmann spotted a polaroid picture of a younger Erin and some blonde lady, the happy smile on Erin’s face simultaneously making her happy and clenching up her heart. Because that was  _ her _ smile. The smile Erin always gave her whenever she complimented Holtzmann on her work.

Or at least, the one she  _ used _ to give her, before all this…

_ Who the Hell is that,  _ she thought to herself, trying hard to hide the jealousy from her face, not wanting Erin to notice,  _ her ex? Blonde, too... Well, that is potentially good, but why’d she keep that? Is she not over her yet? _

“Oh wow”, Patty commented from behind her, having peered over her shoulder and at the photo, “Erin, wouldn’t have thought you’re into Taylor Swift! And you got a pic with her, too, score!”

Clearly, Erin didn’t think that it was any kind of score, judging from how she seemed to shrink on the couch. She had been leaning against Abby, glad for the warmth and comfort her friend provided, but pulled away almost immediately at Patty’s words. She mumbled that she knew it was childish and pathetic and that they could throw the pic out, she really didn’t need it anymore, wrapping her arms around her knees as she tried to make herself as small as possible.

Holtzmann shook her head at once, absurdly relieved that this was the famous singer and not Erin’s ex.

“Come on Erin”, she thus said, beaming at her to show she meant no harm, “clearly, you wanted to keep that. You hid it, badass rising star that you are. And it’s so adorable! Oh my God, look at you, so young and happy! Aw, I think I’m melting.”

“I know it’s stupid”, Erin mumbled in reply, the way she refused to look at Holtzmann making the blonde almost panic as it showed that the physicist had interpreted her words and tone completely wrong, an impression only evidenced by how Erin curled up on the couch, trying to make herself as small as humanly possible again, “You don’t have to mock me...”

“Cupcake”, Holtzmann replied, moving to her side at once while Abby looked mildly shocked – as if Holtzmann would ever earnestly mock Erin - “I’m not mocking you. This is the most adorable thing I have seen all day. It’s so sweet, and it’s so  _ you  _ and I love it.”

Erin gave her a doubtful look, clearly not sure if she could believe this. After all, as Phil had told her, it was embarrassing that a woman her age listened to music like this, and that she really should be happy that he’d thrown out all her CDs of that particular artist before any of his colleagues visited them at their home and saw how she wasted her time. But Holtzmann kept beaming at her, and her eyes were shining, and the physicist could detect no malice at all in her happy gaze and smile.

“Adorable”, Holtzmann repeated, even though her grin faltered a bit as she realized that Erin, if she had gone to all the trouble of getting a photo with the singer, had certainly owned a fair share of merchandise as well, the need to beat Phil up arising again as she fairly quickly figured out what probably had happened to all these things.

Deciding not to bring this up now though, Holtzmann looked at the photo again, her smile coming back with full force at how happy Erin looked. She vowed to herself she’d make sure that Erin would smile like this again some day, carefully putting the photo on the table, telling herself she’d make the most awesome frame Erin had ever seen for it.

“I’m so glad you hid this stuff from him”, she told the physicist, who still looked as if she wasn’t quite sure she believed her, but at least had relaxed a bit again, “That’s my girl! Way to go.”

She beamed at Erin again, and after a few seconds, Erin gave her a tiny smile in response, a little dazed again at the way those words sounded coming from Holtzmann.

_ Is this how they’re meant to sound? _ Erin wondered, a little confused at how loved the phrase made her feel.  _ Like she’s actually proud of me? Like she’s actually happy with me? _ It had never sounded this nice coming from Phil, Erin always feeling relieved rather than happy when he’d said it.

Still, Erin’s little smile only made Holtzmann smile wider, until Erin suspected the corners of her mouth might touch her ears any second. The blonde then reaching out to touch her hand – making sure to do so slowly, not wanting to cause another flinch – the physicist’s smile widening just the tiniest fraction as she realized that perhaps, hiding her things from Phil had been a good thing to do after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Inspiration for the picture described ;) http://scientificxmethod.tumblr.com/post/157023335469


	26. Chapter 26

For the next few days, Erin and Holtzmann practically lived together at the firehouse, with the redhead not having an apartment to go to anymore and the engineer not wanting to leave her alone. At some point, Patty caught on about whatever it was they had at last, not walking in on them kissing like Abby had, but noticing the way Erin always seemed to make sure to be close to Holtzmann, and how Holtzmann often had her hand on the other woman’s back or thigh when they sat on the couch next to each other and Erin was curled up into the blonde’s embrace.

Not wanting to make a fool of herself, Patty asked Abby before she jumped to any conclusions, and Abby confirmed her suspicions; Yes, Erin and Holtzmann had a thing going on. No, she wasn’t exactly sure what that thing was - she doubted even  _ they _ knew - but it seemed to be a thing Erin needed right now, so she wasn’t going to interfere.

Not quite sure what to think of this, Patty wondered if she should bring it up at some point, worried for Holtzmann and what it might do to her should it turn out that Erin didn’t want her that way after all.

While she pondered these things, Holtzmann made sure to take care of Erin the best she could. She practically always ordered food she knew Erin liked, then pretended she couldn’t finish her portion and asked Erin to help her out. It was perhaps a sneaky way to get her to eat things other than fish or salad again, but it was a way that worked, to the great relief of the engineer.

It was painfully apparent during these days how deeply Phil had managed to work his poison into her mind, the physicist constantly scared that she might do something wrong and get Holtzmann angry at her, no matter how hard Holtzmann worked to convince her of the exact opposite.

The engineer kept telling herself that she couldn’t expect Erin to magically get better over night just from some cuddling and kissing, but still it hurt each time the physicist flinched at a too fast movement or just sat there in silence as the others spoke, clearly thinking she had nothing to contribute to their talk. She told herself that after months of Phil abusing her and undermining her self-esteem every chance she got, it would take just as long or perhaps longer to undo the damage he had done, and that she had to be patient, that it only would make things worse if she tried to rush Erin to recovery.

And so Holtzmann was just that. She was patient, she was calm, and simply tried to do whatever she could to help Erin.

What she hadn’t anticipated, though, was the very cause for the physicist’s bad state to make a reappearance, the loud banging against the firehouse’s front door interrupting the quiet evening the two women had been having, snuggled up on the couch and watching documentaries.

“Erin!” Phil’s voice yelled from outside, more banging accompanying his words. Erin stiffened at once, while Holtzmann’s eyes went wide and her heart seemed to stop for a second before it started racing in her chest, bright anger flashing up.  _ How could he dare to show up there, after all he had done. _ “Erin! I know you’re in there!”

_ He’s drunk,  _ Holtzmann realized at once, having heard the slur in the man’s voice. And judging from how Erin started to breathe faster next to her, she had noticed too, the physicist thinking back to the last times she had seen Phil drunk and how these occasions had ended for her; usually with a fist slammed into her ribcage or back, for something she’d said or done to make him angry.

“Erin!” Phil yelled again, making Holtzmann thankful that she had locked the door after Patty had left, “it’s time to come to your senses, don’t you think? If you come out now and go home with me, I’ll forgive this mess you made of things!”

Holtzmann felt as if there was no air left in the room when, in an almost automated response, Erin started rising from the couch.

“Erin”, she brought out, her heart plummeting all the way to her stomach, “what are you doing?!”

She jumped to her feet and rushed to stand in front of Erin, blocking her way. The physicist looked as if her sudden appearance in front of her had torn her out of some sort of daze, but before she could reply, Phil decided he had more to add, pounding the door once more for good measure.

“Erin”, the man called out, not as loud anymore now, but loud enough to be heard, “come on, this has been going on long enough. You know they won’t put up with you forever! Do them and yourself a favour and come back before they kick you out again! I’ll take you back, but only if you come out now!”

“No, no no no”, Holtzmann brought out when Erin actually took a step towards the door, “Erin, no. No. Don’t listen to him.”

“But he’s right”, Erin mumbled, gaze still fixed to the door, and thus missing the mixture of desperation and horror which started to show on Holtzmann’s face, “He’s right. You’re gonna get sick of me. I should just go now, before you hate me. And you heard him, he’s forgiving me…”

“There is nothing you have to be forgiven  _ for _ !” Holtzmann gave back at once, her mind racing as she tried to find the right words, realizing that the poison Phil had worked into Erin’s mind was back with a vengeance, “you can’t be serious Erin. You can’t go back to him; he hurt you! He’ll hurt you again!”

“I just have to try harder”, Erin gave back at once, doubtlessly words she had told herself every single time after he’d hit her, moments she certainly thought about in this very second as Holtzmann could tell from the pained look on her face, “you know he’s right, he’s the only one who’ll put up with me in the long run. You’ll end up hating me if I stay here with you…”

“No, Erin, no”, Holtzmann wasn’t willing to just let this happen, knowing that she’d lose Erin for good if she let her walk out the door, the mere thought making her sick, “that’s not true. I could never hate you, I  _ love  _ you. I love you, and I beg you, don’t listen to him,  _ please. _ ”

“Erin!” Phil called out once more, as if he actually could hear what the engineer was saying and was eager to contradict her and get his victim back to his side, “I’m not going to wait much longer, this is your last chance! Come out now or I’m going and you’ll be alone forever, you know this!”

“No, no”, Holtzmann tried to stop her again as she took another step towards the door, her mind racing as she tried to figure out what to do or to say to make her stop, “Erin, no. Please, no. Don’t do this, please!”

Erin, for her part, was fighting an inner battle, torn between two choices. On the one hand, she wanted nothing more than to stay with Holtzmann. Holtzmann was safe, and warm, and she smelled of cinnamon and held Erin when she cried, treating her with much more kindness than she probably deserved.

On the other hand, she knew Phil was right. She knew it would only be a matter of time before Holtzmann got sick of her. And if she waited for that moment to arrive, then it would be too late for Phil to take her back, meaning Erin would end up all alone in this world. She’d have no home, no job, no safety net, and that prospect frightened her more than Phil’s rage did.

“It’s going to be okay this time”, Erin thus told Holtzmann, while Phil called out to her once more, telling her he wouldn’t wait much longer, “I’ll just try harder, and try to not make him angry so often, then it’ll be fine. It has to be, he’s the only one who’ll have me…”

The resignation in her voice made Holtzmann want to cry, the fact that Phil had managed to reduce Erin to the point where she actually still believed that breaking her heart. Because to her, Erin was an amazing person, one of the loveliest women Holtzmann had ever met, and she couldn’t fathom how anyone would treat someone like her so terribly. How anyone could make someone as brilliant as Erin believe she was deserving of such cruelty, or make her believe how even such cruelty was sometimes ‘more kindness than she deserved’.

“No, he’s not”, Holtzmann gave back, “you know he’s not! I love you, we all do, we won’t kick you out or hate you, I promise. I promise, just please, don’t go back to him, please!”

“Is the Holdsback woman in there with you?” Phil demanded to know, making her wonder if he actually could hear her, “you know she’s not honest with you, Erin! She wants to keep us apart! She wants you to end up alone so she can take advantage of you! That’s how people like her get normal folks like you!”

Erin looked pained, but didn’t contradict him, and Holtzmann felt like throwing up. Her fear was close to panic at this point, and when Phil kept spewing his poison, and Erin looked more and more ready to just go out and back to him, she found it harder and harder to breathe, dully wondering if this was what a panic attack felt like.

And suddenly, her phone was in her hand, and she briefly contemplated calling the police, then realized that this might not help, not if he had a story ready for his behaviour. Not even quite sure why she was doing it, she stared at her contacts, until a certain name caught her eye and she hit the call button, making sure to remain in front of Erin and blocking her way, just in case, nearly crying in relief when her call was taken by the only person she thought who could help them now.

* * *

 

Jennifer Lynch had one of her few free evenings, and had been planning to spend it calmly, with a cup of tasty tea and a good book. She’d not even read three pages though when her phone rang, and she groaned, momentarily even tempted to ignore it, but knowing that she couldn’t; not if it perhaps was the mayor who had another one of his often ridiculous requests.

So she put her book aside, and grabbed the phone. Having expected to see  _ Mayor _ flash on the screen, she was quite surprised when the words  _ Dr J. Holtzmann  _ were showing on the display instead.

“Dr Holtzmann”, she greeted, not quite bothering to keep the annoyance out of her voice, “what is it?”

“You have to do something!” Holtzmann almost yelled at her in response, loud enough to make her flinch, “he’s here, he wants to get her back and she’s about to go and I don’t know what to do to stop her, do something!”

All at once, Jennifer’s annoyance was gone as she sat up straighter, her eyes briefly widening at both the engineer’s words and the sound of her voice. She had been there when the mayor had talked about the people being turned inside out, and Holtzmann had smirked and had joked and hadn’t seemed freaked out the slightest.

She was beyond freaked out now; she sounded  _ scared _ , and that was an emotion Jennifer never would have expected to hear from the blonde.

“I’m on it”, she said at once, knowing they had no time to waste, “make sure Dr Gilbert doesn’t go outside to him.”

“Thank you”, Holtzmann gave back, the fact that she sounded as if she was close to tears only making Jennifer feel more alarmed. She hurriedly hung up, then made a phone call of her own, glad her position meant she had quite a few connections and favours she could call upon.

“Jeremy, thank  _ god _ .” Jennifer breathed out when her call was answered, giving her best to sound upset and perhaps quite a bit more dramatic than needed. “I didn’t know who else to call. I’m in front of the Hook and Ladder, and there’s a man threatening a helpless lady!” she practically gasped into the phone, managing to sound as if she was on the verge of tears, “You have to be quick, please! He has a gun, and he already threatened to shoot her dog!”

She let out a dramatic sniffle, feeling a bit bad for the person on the other end of the line, but knowing it was for a good cause. Knowing the person she’d called still held a torch for her, and knowing he’d want to impressed her as a result, she smiled to herself after she’d hung up. Part of her wished she could be there to see the result of her acting, knowing what the man had done to Erin; and undoubtedly a string of other women, too.

Still, she supposed she’d have to do with the knowledge that she’d actually done something good today, and the knowledge that a certain Dr Hudson was in for a very unpleasant surprise in just a few minutes.

* * *

 

The police arrived with flashing lights and blaring sirens, startling both Holtzmann and Erin enough to make them move to the window, even though Holtzmann was weary that being closer to the door would make Erin rush out and to this horrible man’s side. So far, she had managed to keep her from going out, without actually physically restraining her, but she wasn’t sure how much longer she could do that. And while holding Erin back against her will was the last thing she wanted, she knew she didn’t have much of a choice, should the police not take care of this now.

_ It might make you hate me, Erin,  _ Holtzmann thought to herself while the physicist peered out the window and gasped as the policemen wasted no time, but practically tackled Phil to the ground at once, yelling at him to not resist as they handcuffed him,  _ but I’d rather have you hate me than let you go back to this guy. _

“Oh my God!” Erin cried, Holtzmann quickly moving to block her way, just in case, “what… I can’t let them arrest him!”

“Yes you can”, Holtz argued back at once, glad when the physicist looked at her and did not rush outside to stop the officers, “if I had anything to say, he’d go to jail for years, after everything he did to you. And now coming here drunk and yelling for you to get back to him so he can treat you horribly some more? No way.”

“But I deserved that”, Erin argued, the conviction in her voice making Holtzmann’s heart break again, “I’d make him mad, or embarrass him…”

“That’s not true”, Holtzmann reassured her, while outside, the policemen were dragging Phil to their car, to her great relief, “that’s what he wants you to believe so he can keep you from people who love you and want to help you. I love you Erin, I do, I mean that…”

“But he put up with me nonetheless, didn’t he? I can’t let them do this to him...” But Erin sounded a lot less convinced this time, almost as if she was questioning that last statement. Her voice broke nonetheless, the inner battle in her head finally taking its toll on her as her eyes filled with tears.

Outside, they could hear the engine of the police car roar to life, and Holtzmann finally allowed herself to relax a bit as they were taking this horrible man away. Erin looked towards the window again, but at least this time, she made no move to hurry outside, her gaze returning to Holtzmann a moment later, the doubt and tears the engineer could see in the physicist’s eyes making her heart clench up.

“It’s not true”, the blonde repeated, not quite sure what else to say, but knowing she had to say something, “what he said. He’s not the only one who’ll ever love you, and you deserve all the good things Erin, and none of the crap he did to you…”

She trailed off, cursing herself for not being able to just find the magic words which would fix all of this, especially when Erin literally crumbled to the floor. Despite the fact that Phil had been taken away and couldn’t spew poison anymore, the physicist still looked small and insecure as she sank down, bursting into tears as Holtzmann wrapped her arms around her, figuring just letting Erin get it all out was the best thing she could do for the other woman right now.

Erin cried for a solid 10 minutes before she could even manage to speak, the angry thoughts clouding her brain drowning out most of what Holtzmann had said to her. She was pretty sure that tonight, she had disappointed the only two people who would probably ever care about her. She had disappointed Phil by not standing up for him, by not fighting for him like he had been fighting for her. He’d come all the way here to give her a second chance, a chance she didn’t even deserve, and she’d thrown that generosity back in his face.

And then there was Holtzmann, who Erin noticed had been on the verge of tears for most of the encounter,  _ begging _ Erin to stay. The engineer had kept telling Erin that what Phil had done to her was wrong, that he would only mistreat her again, and Erin wasn’t sure how much of that she believed. Because if she didn’t believe that, then she had lost every chance she still had with Phil for no reason. But if she did believe that, then how disappointed should Holtzmann be with her right now? After all, she’d just tried to go back to a man who hurt her, as if Holtzmann’s kindness over the past weeks had meant nothing to her, just because she was scared. How weak and pathetic did Holtzmann think she was right now? How much did she hate her?

All these thoughts were driving Erin crazy, her head more tumultuous than it had been before, the physicist holding on to Holtzmann for dear life, the comfort of the engineer’s presence being the only thing not driving her over the edge right now.

Holtzmann seemed to sense as much, simply holding Erin for a while as she cried. “Come on”, Holtzmann said after a moment, just to break the silence which had formed between them, “I think we can need some tea after that unexpected appearance of Douchey McDouchepants, you feel like having some?”

She had hoped to elicit a smile with her nickname for the man, but Erin just shook her head a little, not wanting to move away from Holtzmann, her mind still a battlefield. Getting the hint, Holtzmann nodded, pressing a soft kiss to Erin’s temple. “Sleep, then?”

After Erin gave a brief nod, Holtzmann carefully lifted her up, carrying the still sobbing physicist to the bedroom. And even though it hurt her to see the woman she loved so much like this, Holtzmann made a mental a note to send Jennifer a Thank You gift in the very near future. She really did not want to know how this might have ended, had the PA not jumped in to help the way she had.


	27. Chapter 27

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi guys, ForxGood here with a note on the previous chapter. It's an unfortunate fact that a lot of victims of abuse don't manage to leave their abuser the first time in one go, and many of them end up going back to their abuser (either because the abuser promises to be different, or because the victim thinks they have no place else to go). As it's such a common theme in abusive relationships, it's something we wanted to address in this fic as well, mainly to highlight WHY this happens so often. We hope we've done it justice, at least a little.
> 
> That said, on with the fic!

“The douche showed up here last night, drunk out of his mind, yelling for Erin”, Holtzmann filled Abby and Patty in as they sat around the dining table with their breakfast coffee, simultaneously answering the unasked question why she looked as if she hadn’t slept a second the previous night. Erin, to the engineer’s relief, had managed to get some sleep, snuggled up against her and with her head resting on her shoulder, but she herself had barely managed to doze. When she had eventually drifted off, she’d been plagued by nightmarish images of failing to stop Erin, and having to watch how she went back to the man who’d treated her so horribly, losing her forever.  
  
“I panicked a bit”, she admitted, while Abby let out a startled “What?!”, “and called Jennifer Lynch. She must have given quite the story to the police, or pulled some strings, because they were not kind to him when they showed up.”  
  
“Good”, Patty grumbled under her breath, taking note of how Erin’s gaze dropped to the table’s surface at her tone. She momentarily felt bad, but didn’t take it back, figuring that Phil deserved all that and quite a bit more.  
  
She watched how Erin reached out for Holtzmann, almost automatically, and grasped the engineer’s hand. And even though Holtzmann’s eyes lit up when she looked at the physicist in response, it didn’t make Patty feel better, the historian not quite sure that this was a good thing for either of them. Clearly, Erin was in need of comfort, and of someone to take care of her, but Patty wasn’t certain that a relationship with the engineer was what she needed, worried that the redhead would, at some point in the perhaps not too distant future, realize that she didn’t want Holtzmann like that and that the engineer would end up with her heart broken.  
  
She also knew though that she couldn’t just bring this up with Holtzmann, not after how she had failed to listen to her when Erin had still been in this mess of a relationship with Phil. As a result, she decided that she had to speak to Erin instead, just to make sure the redhead wouldn’t end up hurting their friend. The historian was determined to, after how she had failed previously, do things right this time.  
  
  
“Hey Erin?” Patty approached her a short while after breakfast, when Holtzmann had gone up to the lab, keeping the physicist from following her as she had been planning to do when she’d gotten done with the breakfast dishes.

Tensing, Erin turned to look at her, wondering what Patty might want. Did she just want to tell her that she pitied her? Did they want to kick her out again, and had they chosen Patty to give her the bad news? _Or perhaps,_ Erin pondered, _they were mad that Phil had shown up and had made trouble, and they expected her to apologize for this…_  
  
“Can I talk to you for a minute?” Patty continued, blissfully unaware of the thoughts running wild in the physicist’s mind. The woman smiled in a hopefully soothing way at the somewhat terse, nervous nod Erin gave in response. As she moved closer to the redhead, she kept her voice low so she wouldn’t give Erin the impression she was angry at her, and so Holtzmann wouldn’t hear them upstairs. The historian figuring that her eccentric friend would not be happy should she happen to walk in on this conversation.  
  
“First”, she started, having to get something off her chest before she could continue about her worries for Holtzmann’s heart, “I’m truly sorry that Abby and I didn’t realize what this guy is doing to you sooner. But you know you’ll be okay, right?”  
  
Not sure what to think of this, Erin shrugged, struggling to not avert her eyes. She wanted to look down to the floor again, just so she wouldn’t have to see the pity in Patty’s eyes, but Patty had just apologized to her, and even though Erin doubted her friend actually had anything to apologize for - because how could it be their fault that she had been stupid and weak enough to get into such a situation - she figured it would be rude to look away at this point. And upsetting Patty was the last thing she wanted right now.  
  
“But that is not the only reason I want to talk to you”, Patty said, earning an insecure look from the redhead as she wondered what it was that Patty _did_ want. “Um… I hope I’m not overstepping or something, but… Erin, baby, you know we all love you, so don’t get this the wrong way, but do you think getting into something with Holtzy is a good idea?”  
  
Erin blanched, and Patty immediately felt bad, but told herself that she couldn’t back down, if only for the sake of Holtzmann’s heart. After how she had failed her friend before, she had to make up for this now.  
  
“No judgement or anything”, she quickly told Erin, who just stared back at her with a deer in the headlights expression, “but I’m tryin’ to look out for Holtzy here, too. And if you realize that this isn’t what you want or need… It’ll break her heart.”  
  
“I tried to tell her that”, Erin mumbled, gaze dropping to the floor now after all, fingers nervously rubbing against each other, “I tried, _I really did_. I told her I’m not sure this is what I want, but she’s so nice to me… She makes me feel safe, and it does feel good to kiss her but I don’t want to hurt her…”

 _She sounds a bit like a child_ , Patty noted, now fully realizing how small Erin looked, how unlike the woman she’d come to know when they had first started this. _She’s hurt, she’s trying, and god knows her heart is in the right place…_ She was about to tell Erin that Holtz could still be hurt, despite her best intentions, but Erin wasn’t done speaking yet.

“She told me she doesn’t care. She said she’ll do it if it helps as long as I’ll let her, but I don’t think she understand how much I could hurt her, if not even Phil would put up with me… But maybe if you talked to her…?”

She looked up at Patty then, her eyes pleading and scared, and that’s when it fully sunk in for the historian how much she had just fucked up.

“Erin, baby, no”, she quickly said, wringing her hands, wanting to touch the physicist, but not sure if it really was a good idea, “if you feel safe and good with Holtzy, that is how it should be, alright? Especially if she says she knows what she’s doing. God know that girl is an expert on unstable things, so she’ll be fine. Forget I ever said anything. I, uh, I gotta get some work done now.”

Erin could only stare as Patty scurried back to her desk, tears springing into her eyes at the other woman’s words. _Unstable_. That had really hit home for her, especially considering she knew the historian was right. Erin was a wreck, an emotionally unstable wreck, and she was really just burdening Holtzmann by being with her.  
  
After a moment, when she was sure she wouldn’t end up crying after all - because it would only prove how ‘unstable’ she apparently was, and Holtzmann didn’t deserve that - Erin went upstairs to join Holtzmann in the lab. She still felt quite terrible about doing so, telling herself again that it wasn’t right to make the engineer put up with her like this, to use her like this so she’d feel better if she didn’t even know what she truly wanted.

The things Patty had said to her weighed heavy on her mind, mixing with Phil’s poison there until she was sure that there was only one thing she could do.

“We should end this”, Erin blurted out, causing Holtzmann to freeze and look at Erin in disbelief.

Holtzmann had realized that something was wrong with Erin – a different kind of wrong than the damage Phil had done - the physicist oddly distant and quiet as she watched Holtzmann work. They hadn’t kissed once since Erin had joined her up in the lab, which was a bit weird, and Erin had avoided all other physical contact with her too, which was even more disconcerting. But she had been planning to give Erin a few more minutes to try and get through this, wanting to give the physicist some space if she needed it.

Clearly that had been the wrong call to make.

“What?” Holtzmann stammered out, dropping her tools on the bench and walking over to Erin.  
  
“I don’t know what I’m doing here with you,” Erin continued, now averting her eyes from Holtzmann - and feeling stupid and weak for doing so, because after all Holtzmann had done for her, didn’t she at least deserve Erin manning up and looking her in the eye when she did this? “I’ll hurt you, we shouldn’t be together… You think you love me, but you’ll end up getting annoyed by me like Phil did. If he couldn’t even put up with me, how can I…”  
  
She broke off and bit her lip, fighting to hold back tears. Unsure where this was coming from, and caught completely off-guard by this sudden outburst, Holtzmann just stared at her for another moment, then cleared her throat, giving her best to sound steady when she replied.

“Cupcake, we’ve talked about this. If this is what you need, you’ll get it from me as long as you need. And I do love you, I mean that… Where is this coming from?”  
  
“We shouldn’t be together”, Erin told her, sounding as if she was close to tears now, “I’ll only end up hurting you, you don’t deserve that… You know I’m right; Phil said so, and Abby, and Patty…”  
  
She recoiled visibly at the anger which suddenly showed on Holtzmann’s face, which flared up the very second she’d said Patty’s name. Had it not been so deeply ingrained in her mind that whatever she said and did was wrong, she might have realized that Holtz wasn’t mad at her, but as it was, she saw it as directed at her, bracing herself for the outburst and perhaps even the hit which certainly would come now. _Oh God I made her mad, I made Holtz angry… She’s finally had enough of me, I’m so stupid. She’ll hurt me now, and I can’t even blame her. Phil was right, I deserve it, I deserve this…  
_  
Holtzmann picked up on her fear, and realized at once that this time, _she’d_ caused it, simply by not hiding her anger. And this, combined with what Erin just had said, with what Patty had dared to do after initially having dismissed her like this, suddenly was just too much, the engineer biting back tears as she hurried to the stairway and yelled down to the ground floor. “PATTY! You get your ass up here NOW!”  
  
“Holtz, no”, Erin tried to calm her down, but Holtzmann knew she would burst into tears the moment she’d look at her, so she didn’t even turn around. _At least_ , she darkly thought to herself, _Patty looked somewhat guilty when she came up the stairs_ , the uneasy look she shot Holtzmann making it clear that she knew exactly why the engineer had called her up to her lab.  
  
“Did you”, the blonde started, biting each word off as if speaking physically pained her, “tell Erin to break up with me?”  
  
“Maybe, kind of...”, Patty mumbled, while Abby appeared behind her, looking concerned; The researched had never heard Holtzmann yell like that before, not even when she confronted them with Erin’s situation.

Speaking of Erin… The redhead was on the verge of tears, and with Holtzmann as distraught as she was, Abby rushed over to her friend, placing a comforting hand on her shoulder as Patty continued to speak. “but that was before I realized—”  
  
“So _now_ you are judgy about her relationship?” Holtzmann interrupted her, sounding so angry that Patty felt like running back downstairs at once, “Now? Really? After you dismissed her when she was in _actual_ trouble with Phil? _To whom she would have gone back_ , by the way, if I hadn’t stopped her, because she thinks this is what she deserves now! She thinks no one but him can ever love her, that is how badly he messed her up. And then you have the _nerve_ to ask her to break up with me?! When all I want is to make her happy?!”  
  
“I was worried for you, Holtzy!” Patty tried to justify her actions, but Holtzmann wasn’t willing to listen. She just shot the historian a glare, giving her a good chance to see the pain and tears in her eyes, before she, with a strangled, almost held back sob, turned and rushed past a shocked Erin to the stairs leading up to the roof, the door slamming moments later, leaving them all behind in startled silence.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Before the Patty hate rains down upon us in the comments section; remember everyone is WAY out of their depth here. Erin is in a horrible mental place, and without knowing the details or even the basis of the abuse, it's immensely difficult to help someone if you have no experience with such a situation. Everyone is trying their best - even Patty.


	28. Chapter 28

Even if they hadn’t seen Holtzmann run up to the roof, Patty would have known that she’d find her there. The roof was Holtzmann’s go-to place whenever she was upset, and that she had been anything but upset when she’d rushed off was out of the question.  
  
Making sure that Abby was with Erin, the physicist completely desolate – and apparently convinced that it was her fault Holtzmann had gotten mad – Patty followed Holtzmann up to the roof. She found the engineer sitting with her back leaning against the wall which kept people from falling off the ledge, her knees drawn up to her chest, tears streaming down her face.  
  
“Holtzy”, Patty started, slowly approaching the blonde, not quite surprised when Holtzmann mumbled “go away” in response. She shook her head, knowing that she had to fix this and that it’d only get worse if she waited, and moved to sit next to the engineer instead, ignoring the glare Holtzmann sent her way.  
  
“I’m sorry”, the historian started, not bothering to beat around the bush, “I messed up. Big time. I’m truly sorry, but I didn’t mean to judge or hurt you, I was just worried that… I don’t know, not that Erin is purposefully using you, ‘cause the Lord knows she’s in no state to do that right now, but that she’s still doing it, in a way, and that you’d end up getting hurt…”  
  
“You think I’m not aware of that?” Holtz demanded to know, wiping at her eyes angrily, hating it that Patty was seeing her cry, but finding herself unable to stop, “of course I am! I’m not stupid, Patty. I just want to help her, and if that is what she needs, fine. And you have _no_ right to judge me for that - or her, for that matter. None at all.”  
  
“I know, I know”, Patty reassured her, earning a doubtful look, her heart clenching up at the tears trickling down Holtzmann’s cheeks, “and I’m so sorry, I really am. I should have talked to you instead of ambushing her with this, I—”  
  
“But would you have listened to me?”, Holtzmann interrupted her, sounding bitter now, “‘Cause you didn’t when I tried to talk to you about Douchey McDouchepants, did you? You didn’t. But if you had, we might have gotten her out sooner. We might have gotten her out before he’d brainwashed her enough to make her believe that someone like him is the only one who’ll ever love her, and that she deserves everything he did to h-her…”   
  
Her voice cracked and she buried her face in her knees again, muffling her sob. Realizing how far out of her depth she was - how far out of their depth they all were - all Patty could think to do was to reach out and rub Holtzmann’s back, glad that at least the engineer didn’t shy away from her touch.

“She was going to go back to him, Patty.” Holtzmann was full-on crying now, a sight Patty Tolan didn’t think she’d ever see. “She kept saying she just had to be better, that it’d be okay, and that she’d just go back because that’s what she deserved…” Her sobbing made her a little difficult to understand, but Patty got the general gist of it, the woman paling a little when she realized how her own words must have sounded to Erin. “She would have gone back to him, I could have lost her for good if I hadn’t… If Jennifer hadn’t…”

Patty had to fight hard to hold back her own tears as she apologized again, still feeling awful even when Holtzmann let herself be pulled into a hug, asking herself how she could have messed up this badly.

 

* * *

  
  
At the same time, Abby and Erin were on the couch downstairs, Abby soothingly rubbing Erin’s back. Erin still found it hard to look at her though, fingers moving nervously against each other as she kept glancing at the stairway which led to the roof. She was halfway expecting Holtzmann to come storming back down and start yelling at her, to ask her how she could be so dumb, and perhaps smack her, too, because that was what people did when they got mad at her, and that was what she deserved.  
  
“Erin”, Abby gently said, rubbing her back in soothing circles, “talk to me. Tell me what’s wrong.”  
  
“I made Holtzmann mad”, Erin mumbled in reply, the researcher staring at her in disbelief, “she’s gonna be so angry at me when she comes back…”  
  
“Honey, no”, Abby tried to reassure her, even though part of her knew that it wouldn’t be so easy. She didn’t know the true extent of how badly Phil had abused the redhead, but she knew it had been bad, and a few words wouldn’t be enough to fix the damage he had done.  
  
“It’s going to be fine, right?”, Erin asked timidly, surprising the researcher to no end. Maybe there was some hope after all. Maybe Holtzmann had managed to get through to Erin, allowing her to at least _consider_ the possibility that Holtzmann would never dare to hurt her.

Until Erin went on speaking, Abby’s eyes widening, her heart clenching up at what the redhead said next, “I mean… Phil hurt me too, but he didn’t leave me… Maybe she won’t either. I made her mad, I deserve it, I just… I hope it won’t be so bad…”  
  
All Abby could do at hearing this was stare, her heart breaking as she realized fully what Erin was implying, and how strangely easily these horrible words seemed to fall from her friend’s lips.  
  
_She thinks Holtzmann will come back in here and hit her, or do something else to hurt her_ , she thought to herself, feeling strangely numb all of a sudden, _and she seems completely okay with the thought. She’s sure she deserves it. He’s messed with her mind so much that she thinks Holtz will hurt her and that she deserves it…_  
  
“Erin”, she said, not sure what to say to make this better, but realizing she had to say something. The way Erin looked at her in response, the strange mixture of fear and resignation in her eyes, only made Abby feel worse.  
  
“Erin, honey, no”, she tried again, never stopping the tender rubbing of the other woman’s back, “Holtz would never do that to you, ever. He might have made you think it’s okay to do this, or… I don’t know, right, but it’s not. And Holtz would never hurt you.”  
  
Erin just shrugged, and for a moment, Abby felt like throwing up at this lack of reaction. She took in a deep breath, giving her best to sound calm and controlled and not as if she was judging Erin when she spoke up again.  
  
“Erin”, she started, choosing her next words carefully, not wanting to freak the physicist out, “maybe you should… get professional help with this. You know we all want to help you, but he did so much damage, none of us is qualified to…”  
  
“Therapy”, Erin quietly added when Abby didn’t finish, “you’re thinking I should go to therapy.”  
  
_She thinks you’re crazy_ , an all too familiar voice whispered in the depths of her mind, sounding suspiciously like Phil, _she thinks you’re crazy, and soon they’ll all think that. Patty already told you you’re unstable, and soon Holtz will realize that, too. And when she does, she’ll end whatever it is you have going on with her, and then they’ll kick you out. And when they do, you’ll have nowhere to go. Stupid little Ghost Girl… You should have gone with Phil while you still had the chance..._  
  
She started to breathe faster as fear began to set in, and began to grow inside her. Abby was alarmed, but didn’t know how to stop the panic attack from happening, having much too little experience with all this. As a result, the other woman was absurdly relieved when Patty came back downstairs, figuring Holtzmann couldn’t be far behind.

When it was clear the engineer was nowhere in sight, Abby’s heart sank, the woman still trying valiantly to calm the hyperventilating Erin down.

  
“Holtz”, Erin brought out next to her, in a thin, breathless voice, “I…”

She came to her feet, suddenly just knowing that she had to be close to the engineer, even if Holtzmann would probably hurt her for how angry she had made her. She’d rather take that and then maybe get a hug than not be close to the blonde at all, telling herself that so far, Holtz had known what to do when the panic had threatened to overwhelm her every time.  
  
“Up on the roof still, honey”, Patty told her, though she wasn’t sure Erin had heard her, the physicist looking like a deer caught in the headlights as she almost ran up the stairs.

Watching Erin all but flee to the safety of Holtz’s embrace, Abby burying her face in her hands and asked herself for what seemed like the millionth time how she could have been so blind, how could have let it get so bad. She was supposed to be Erin’s best friend, she _knew_ something was off, she could have done something sooner…

Patty sat down next to her and silently put a comforting arm around her, knowing exactly what was going through the researcher’s mind. “She’ll be okay…” The historian nodded, even though she was having more and more trouble believing those words herself.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One more for the road and all that... Starting monday the regular monday-thursday schedule will resume.


	29. Chapter 29

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Now with Holtzbert Week being done, back to Monday and Thursday updates we go :)

“Holtz?” Erin’s voice sounded small, the insecurities she felt clear as she stepped onto the roof, spotting the engineer at once.

Holtzmann was sitting on the floor, her back against the wall and looking up at Erin when she heard her voice. Even though Erin could tell she had been crying until not all too long ago, the blonde managed a smile when her eyes met the redhead’s, before coming to her feet and leaning against the wall behind her, Erin taking that as permission to all but rush into her arms, knowing she needed the blonde’s comfort now more than anything.

“Hey”, the engineer made herself say, wiping at her eyes again, not wanting Erin to see how close to fresh tears she still was, knowing the physicist would only blame herself again, “sorry for running off like that, I kinda got… overwhelmed.”

“I’m sorry”, Erin gave back, fingers fidgeting nervously as she struggled to keep her breathing under control, “I shouldn’t have made you so angry, I’m sorry…”

Her gaze dropped to the floor, and her posture tensed even as she was still trembling in Holtz’s arms. By now, Holtzmann had accidentally made too fast movements towards her often enough to know what this behaviour meant, feeling like crying again, but bravely fighting back her tears.

“Erin, my beloved cupcake”, she said once she could be sure she wouldn’t burst into tears the moment she’d open her mouth, “I’d… really like to hug you right now. Hug you, not hurt you.”

Erin looked honestly confused at this, and it broke Holtzmann’s heart all over again, a feeling which only got worse when the redhead responded. “Why would you want to… I made you mad, why would you want to hug me?”

“Because I like hugging you and because you smell like coconut”, Holtzmann gave back without missing a beat, only making her look more confused, “and because I’ll never, ever hit you. You didn’t make me mad, and even if you had, I wouldn’t hurt you.”

Erin still looked confused, and a bit doubtful, but clearly had no answer to this, since she just nodded. She assumed that Holtzmann would probably just end up pressing down onto her lower back, where the bruising still hurt. It was something Phil had done every now and then, usually when she had done something to annoy him, but nothing bad enough to truly make him mad. It had been a subtle but effective way to make sure Erin knew her place, and surely at this point it was the least she deserved for the way she’d made Holtzmann feel.

Instead, the engineer made sure to keep her hands away from those spots as she wrapped her up in an embrace. This stunned the redhead and made her wonder again why the engineer would be so kind with her, before she remembered that she should hug her back and did just that, burying her face in the other woman’s shoulder and inhaling her scent, slowly feeling herself calm down again.

“I thought you’d hurt me”, she mumbled after a while, when she was breathing a little more normally again, “I was sure you… I made you so mad, I thought…”

“Never”, Holtzmann reassured her, rubbing her back, a gesture which made her feel much better than when Abby had done it, “I don’t think you actually can make me mad. But even if you do manage, one day, I won’t hurt you, alright? I won’t hurt you, and I won’t leave you.”

“…not even if I tell you Abby thinks I should go to therapy?” Erin whispered, barely loud enough for Holtzmann to hear, “she said I should…”

“That’s not a reason to leave you, not at all”, Holtzmann reassured her, still rubbing her back, mindful of staying away from the bruises, “and… my lovely muffin, don’t get me wrong, but it might not be a bad idea. I want to help you through this, you know I want to, but I don’t know if I’ll… be enough.”

In response, Erin only held on to her tighter; and for a while, they just remained there, holding on to each other, Erin telling herself over and over that Holtzmann wouldn’t hurt her or leave her, while Holtzmann kept holding her close, telling herself that she had to be strong for Erin’s sake and that she could do this if it’d mean that Erin would someday get better.

* * *

“You’re trembling”, Holtzmann observed a while later, pulling back a bit from the embrace to look at her, “come on, we should go back inside. We can get some tea if you like.”

Even though the thought of Holtzmann making tea for her again made Erin feel like a burden once more, she made herself nod, even managing a weak smile at the way the engineer beamed at her in response. She told herself that certainly, Holtzmann was feeling a bit cold by now, as well, and so she would want tea too, and wouldn’t just make it for her, so it’d be okay.

Not quite ready to let go of Holtzmann after all the excitement, Erin held on to her hand as they walked back to the door. The feeling of the engineer’s fingers curling around hers helped her calm down further, even though she felt bad again when they made their way to the ground floor and found Abby and Patty there, the way both of them fell silent the second they entered making it quite clear to Erin that they had been talking about Holtzmann and her.

_ They probably still think this is a bad idea _ , she told herself, not even realizing how her gaze dropped down to the floor. Holtzmann, of course, picked up on it at once and squeezed her hand tenderly. _ They’ll think you’re only using Holtz and are going to hurt her… _

“Hey”, Abby said, sounding kind enough to make Erin look at her again, with a mixture of apprehension and slight surprise at the friendly tone of her voice, “feeling better? Both of you?”

“Bit cold”, Holtzmann replied, skilfully avoiding any comment on the emotional state of both Erin and her, “I was gonna make some tea. You want some too?”

“Sure”, Abby gave back, looking at Erin in concern, a glance the physicist missed since her gaze was focused on the floor between her feet. Patty nodded her agreement as well, the two of them watching how Holtz and Erin moved on to the kitchen afterwards, Abby holding back a sigh about how messed up all of this was.

“I suggested Erin should get professional help”, she then told Patty, keeping her voice low so the two wouldn’t hear, “because Holtz tries, we know she does, but she’s no therapist…”

“Maybe Holtzy should consider that, too”, Patty sighed, with a concerned look towards the kitchen, “she tries not to let it show, for Erin’s sake, but this is taking a toll on her, too, and she won’t be able to do this forever.”

“We should have put a stop to this whole mess with Phil earlier”, Abby mumbled, shaking her head, once more asking herself how she could have failed her best friend like that, blinded by her own fear that Erin would leave her again and thus missing all the alarm signals, just standing by as Phil had abused the redhead and never noticing a thing.

“God, she should hate me”, she mumbled, shaking her head. Patty gave her a concerned look and reached out to rub her back, earning an unhappy sigh in response, the two just sitting there in silence afterwards as they thought about how badly that horrible man had damaged their friend, and wondered if it had been too much, or if Erin would someday return to her old self.


	30. Chapter 30

The anniversary of the nightly hauntings hadn’t happened too long ago, and the day had been one of the more upsetting ones since Erin had gotten out of the relationship. This, combined with Phil dropping by drunk to yell for her, led to another nightmare, the physicist finding herself frozen in bed as the apparition appeared to spew hatred at her.

“You know they’re not gonna put up with you much longer”, the ghostly Gretta DeMille told her, smiling cruelly - and still, Erin noted, speaking in Phil’s voice, “you made Holtzmann angry today, even if she tells you she wasn’t angry at you. They think you’re crazy, they want to send you to therapy. And hey, who knows; maybe they’ll have you locked up in the loony bin once they realize how messed up you really are. Messed up and pathetic. You know they’re gonna kick you out again soon, not even Holtzmann is gonna deal with this for long.”

The apparition laughed cruelly as Erin tried to cover her ears, but it did nothing to block out the hateful words. And then, as it happened every single time she had this nightmare, the ghost unhinged her jaw and began spewing at her, the physicist crying out when the blood splattered onto her and the bed, drenching her from head to toe.

She woke up screaming, certain that not only she would be covered in the dreadful stuff, but that it would have gotten onto Holtzmann, too.  _ And Holtzmann would be so mad, not only did she wake her up with her childish yelping in the middle of the night, she also would have gotten her bed slimed. Certainly, Holtzmann would hit her this time, there was no way the engineer would take that in stride and not be mad at her, and she’d deserve every single hit she’d get for this. _

“Erin”, Holtzmann’s voice reached her ears, but she couldn’t react to it – she had woken from the nightmare, and there was no slime, but she could feel the iron band of panic around her chest, making it hard to breathe. She had screamed, again, and was crying, again, and had woken Holtzmann up, and she remembered all too well what had happened the last time she had woken Phil like that. The bruise from that moment hadn’t faded yet, and still hurt when she pushed down on it.

“Erin, honey, it’s okay, it’s okay”, she heard Holtzmann say, in a low, but kind voice, and she could barely believe her ears, “it was just a bad dream. It’s okay, you’re safe, I’m not gonna let anyone hurt you, alright?”

She could feel Holtzmann embrace her, and tensed, suddenly sure that now, the hit would come –  _ perhaps, _ she morbidly thought to herself,  _ Holtz just didn’t want to lash out blindly like Phil had when she had woken him up the same way. Perhaps she wanted to make sure she wouldn’t leave a trace where others could see, like he normally had, when he hadn’t just blindly smacked her for angering him so much. _

“Shhhht”, she heard Holtzmann mumble into her ear, still struggling to breathe, the tears streaming down her face not making this easier, “shhhht, it’s okay, it’s okay. No one’s going to hurt you. I’m not going to hurt you. Just try to breathe, okay?”

She could feel Holtzmann tenderly rub her back in the dark, and even though the engineer had been torn out of deep slumber literally minutes ago, she was keeping her hands away from the places which still hurt. That knowledge was enough to make Erin break completely, a sob so rough that it hurt tearing free from her throat as she slumped into Holtzmann’s embrace.

“I’m sorry”, she finally brought out, in a breathless whimper, “I had… the ghost, she was back and yelling at me, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to…”

“It’s okay”, Holtzmann reassured her once more, still rubbing her back in soothing circles, “it’s not your fault that you had a nightmare.”

“I woke you”, Erin mumbled, finding it a bit easier to breathe now, the fact that Holtz was nothing but understanding and caring helping her to quell the panic, “I’m sorry, I…”

“Don’t worry about that”, the engineer gave back at once, earning a look of disbelief, the physicist’s eyes by now having adjusted enough to the dark to let her see Holtzmann’s face. She was astonished to find nothing but care and love in the blonde’s features, not a hint of annoyance or even anger at being woken in the middle of the night by her screams.

“Hey, you know how you can wake some people up at any time for, I dunno, bacon? Or chocolate?”

“Um, yes?” Erin gave back, not sure what that had to do with anything. Holtzmann smiled at her, and pulled her a bit closer, her next words nearly making the redhead cry again, touching her deeply. “Some people, you can wake them up for food of any kind. For me, I’ll never mind being woken up for you. Or by you. Doesn’t matter. Okay? Please don’t feel bad, it’s not your fault.”

“You’re too good to me”, Erin mumbled in reply, resting her head on Holtzmann’s shoulder. Now that the panic was fading, she realized how tired she still was. She’d barely been asleep for a few hours when the nightmare had woken her, and certainly, the engineer felt the same.

If she did, she didn’t let it show, focused fully on Erin and on making her feel better.

“The best I can do can never be too good for you, my lovely cupcake”, she reassured the physicist, making her smile weakly at her.

Giving in to a sudden impulse, Erin kissed her then, the kiss deepening surprisingly quickly. The redhead wrapped her arms around the smaller woman as they kissed, all at once not even minding the taste of tears when she felt one of Holtzmann’s hands move to entangle in her hair, just eager to show her how much she meant to her and how glad she was to have her in her life after the whole mess with Phil and how said mess had ended.

They stayed like that for a while, wrapped in each other’s embrace, Holtzmann more than a little hesitant to push this any further. If anything, she was going to make sure Erin set the pace in this relationship. This was about her; Holtzmann was just going along for the ride, taking whatever she could get and giving whatever she still had left to give. She was still certain that sometime soon, Erin was going to admit to being done with her, that this wasn’t what she wanted, and she didn’t want the physicist to end up accusing her of abusing her mental state.

If she had any shred of self-preservation still left, she wouldn’t even have started this. Or she would have put a stop to it days ago, knowing she was only setting herself up for heartbreak. But  _ dammit _ , if this was what Erin needed to feel better, to help her get back to her old self, then Holtzmann was going to give it to her.

The only thing worse than having her heart broken by the Erin Gilbert she’d fallen in love with was the idea that the Erin Gilbert she’d fallen in love with was lost to her forever.

Not that this made it any easier when Erin rested her head on the blonde’s chest, the scent of her shampoo tickling Holtz’s nose as she dared herself to dream that maybe,  _ just maybe _ , Erin would stick around once she felt better.

* * *

The next morning, Erin was the first to wake up, again experiencing a moment of disorientation before she remembered where she was and what had happened the previous night. She remembered waking up screaming, waking up Holtzmann with her screams – and how the engineer, unlike Phil, had held her and had comforted her, had told her that it was okay and that she shouldn’t feel bad.

And how they had kissed, in the middle of the night, and how good that had felt, how sweet and oddly right it had been to kiss Holtz that way.

As if the engineer was somehow reacting to these thoughts, she let out a strange mixture of grunt and snore next to her. The sound was oddly endearing, and a tiny smile tugged at the corners of Erin’s mouth as she turned a bit so she could look at the blonde.

She felt as if she could lie there and just watch Holtzmann sleep for hours, the engineer looking so relaxed and peaceful as she slumbered – relaxed enough, Erin noted, to be drooling on the pillow, but she couldn’t find it within herself to care much – but she feared that she might wake the blonde up if she’d look at her for too long. And so, she rolled onto her back again and looked up at the ceiling instead.

It was dangerous though, she quickly realized, to just lay there and let her mind wander – because her mind immediately went to dark, unpleasant areas, a nasty little voice asking her how much longer she thought Holtzmann would put up with her like this, and if she was ready for the engineer’s pity to run out any day now.

_ You don’t really think this is what she wants, do you?  _ she couldn’t help but think, Phil’s poison still strong.  _ An anxious, messed up girlfriend who cries at the drop of a hat and wakes her up screaming in the middle of the night. You can’t make her happy like this. _

_ Then I’ll have to change _ , she thought a second later, a glimpse of the old Erin breaking through, the thought of losing Holtzmann all at once helping her find some of her old strength instead of sending her into a panic attack.  _ And I know where to find help with that. Maybe therapy isn’t such a bad idea after all… _

The thought of therapy made her think back to her childhood, her parents, and the ghost they hadn’t believed her about. None of these thoughts were happy, but she knew that she had been right about ghosts all along, that she hadn’t been crazy back then, and that it hadn’t been her fault, and not just a child’s cry for attention, either.

_ And perhaps _ , she thought to herself,  _ if I had been right about the ghosts, I somehow, magically, could be right again this time.  _ Maybe therapy would help; and then she’d be the girlfriend Holtzmann deserved. She’d be able to make her happy and repay her for how kind Holtz had been to her ever since the relationship with Phil had ended _. _

She vowed to talk to Abby sometime today, and ask the woman to help her make an appointment somewhere.

“Blargh”, Holtzmann let out next to her, startling her out of her thoughts, the engineer making spitting noises as she lifted her head off the pillow. Erin belatedly realized that a few blonde strands had somehow ended up in the general vicinity of Holtz’ mouth, prompting her to make another rather unpleasant noise as she pawed at it. The physicist found it oddly adorable, as the blonde blinked sleepily as she tried to get her bearings.

Then, after a few more sleepy blinks, her eyes met Erin’s, and immediately, Holtzmann smiled. Erin felt her heart clench up as she once more fully realized that the engineer indeed wasn’t angry at her for waking her up in the middle of the night, but instead was happy to see her, even right after waking up.

“Good morning, my lovely cupcake”, Holtzmann said, only strengthening the impression that she was glad to wake up next to Erin, instead of annoyed to see the person who had torn her out of her sleep in the middle of the night, for something as childish as a bad dream.

“Good morning”, Erin gave back, touched by the way the engineer was looking at her, as if waking up next to her was the greatest thing which could ever happen to her, something Erin didn’t quite understand.

Certainly, someone like Holtzmann had woken up next to women way more gorgeous and smarter and much less pathetic than she was.

Then, the engineer leaned closer and tenderly kissed her, a sweet and loving kiss which made her heart flutter. And somehow, the kiss was enough to make the doubts and worries stop, at least for a moment. A small smile was on Erin’s face by the time they pulled apart, the way Holtzmann beamed at her making her heart skip a beat yet again.

“So, hot stuff”, the engineer then said, beaming again when Erin blushed a bit at the nickname. Sure, it was just the faintest colouration of her cheeks, but it was a sight Holtzmann hadn’t seen in  _ way _ too long, and she’d missed it more than she cared to admit. “you wanna get up, or you wanna cuddle some more?”

In all honesty, Erin wanted to cuddle -  wanted that a lot, in fact - but she told herself that surely, Holtzmann had more important things to do. And so, she said that getting up was fine, nodding when the engineer asked her if she wanted to shower first – only to run into a slight problem as she had to realize that all the comfortable clothes she had were in the laundry, leaving her with nothing but her stiff, professional clothing to wear.

“Um, Holtz?” she said after a moment – she felt horrible for burdening the engineer with this new problem, but the thought of wearing one of her professor outfits made her skin crawl, and she’d rather risk the engineer being annoyed or angry at than walk around all day like she had when she had been with Phil.  _ Annoyance and anger I can handle _ , she told herself,  _ but not thinking of this man all day.  _ She knew that just that would happen if she’d look the way he’d always liked her to.

“I, um”, she started when Holtzmann gave her a questioning look, “I kinda… need something to wear. Do have another sweatshirt I could borrow? Or a t-shirt?”

“Sure thing, muffin”, Holtzmann replied at once, not even hesitating a second, “if you wanna, go ahead and shower, I’ll go look for something and drop it off in the bathroom, okay?”

“Okay, thanks”, Erin gave back, relieved and once again a bit startled at how endlessly patient and willing to help Holtzmann appeared to be. She gave her a tiny, shy smile, and once again, the engineer beamed back at her, then practically skipped off to find her something to wear.

As she stood beneath the hot water, Erin thought back to the previous night, to how differently Holtzmann had reacted to her nightmare compared to how Phil had handled it. Holtzmann hadn’t gotten angry at her, not even when she just had been woken up so harshly, and that truly amazed Erin. Instead of berating her, or even hitting her, all Holtzmann had been focused on was how to make Erin feel better.

_ I don’t deserve her _ , she thought to herself, blinking hard against sudden tears as she washed her hair,  _ I don’t deserve to burden her like this. But I don’t want to not have her in my life, either… I just hope I won’t hurt her. _

She fought bravely to hold the tears back, figuring that Holtzmann would know at once that she’d cried if she’d let them fall.  _ She had worried and bothered the engineer enough already, _ she told herself, only to flinch when she heard the bathroom door open, her initial thought being that it was Phil coming in to yell at her for taking too long.

_ It’s just Holtz,  _ she then reminded herself of the fact that she was nowhere near Phil anymore,  _ bringing you something to wear. _

“I found something you might like”, the engineer’s voice came, as if to confirm that it was indeed hers, “I’m leaving it here on the sink, okay? Don’t worry, the sink’s dry.”

“Thank you”, Erin gave back, glad that her voice sounded somewhat steady and not as if she had been on the verge of tears – again – not even two minutes ago. Holtzmann told her it was no problem, then left the room again, her footsteps moving away while Erin finished in the shower.

She figured that Holtzmann had brought her some shirt or sweater she kept around the firehouse, one of the many sets of comfortable clothes Holtzmann seemed to own. What she hadn’t expected upon pulling the curtain back was to find a distinctly familiar hoodie, her heart skipping a beat and her eyes going wide as she grabbed it and unfolded it, not believing her eyes.

“Where did she…?” she mumbled to herself, trying to remember when she had brought this particular piece of clothing to the firehouse. The sweater she was holding was a bright purple, with white text on the front and back and an item Erin recalled she’d bought at one of the Taylor Swift concerts she’d gone to. She had been convinced Phil had thrown it out, especially considering that she knew she wouldn’t have risked fighting for it, not after all the other things she’d already hidden from him.

And yet, here it was, smelling just as it had when she had worn it the last time, ready for her to pull it on and think back to how happy she had been during the concert.

“Wow”, she mumbled, not even realizing that Holtzmann might hear her and think that she’d lost her mind. She brought the hoodie up and pressed it against her chest, not noticing that she started to smile, a genuine, warm and happy smile, and one which was still there by the time she emerged from the bathroom and went to find the engineer, at least for now feeling oddly at peace and as if things could be alright again some day.

Abby and Patty came to the firehouse just in time for breakfast, bringing fresh donuts yet again. And again, Erin had one to go along with her coffee (which she had gotten herself this time, so Holtzmann hadn’t been able to sneak sugar into it. _ But at least, _ the engineer figured,  _ she was eating something _ ). None of them brought up the painful events of the previous day, instead speaking of harmless topics, neither Abby nor Patty wanting to ruin the somewhat peaceful atmosphere.

Again, though, Abby found herself thinking about professional help for Erin as she watched her friend as unobtrusively as possible, not wanting the redhead to notice. Erin looked a bit better than she had the previous day, but she still was haggard and pale, looking small as she sat next to Holtzmann. Abby reasoned that while the situation wasn’t perfect, it was probably a good thing that Erin was making sure to stay close to the engineer again, and didn’t appear as if she expected the blonde to smack her any moment.

Once breakfast had been finished, Holtzmann let the others know that she’d go up to the lab and get some work done. Surprisingly, Erin hung behind a little, telling Holtzmann she’d be up in a minute before glancing at Abby. Getting the hint, Holtzmann kissed her head before heading upstairs, asking Patty to help her with something real quick.

As Holtzmann and Patty left, Abby stayed behind, walking towards an already fidgeting Erin as she stood in the kitchen.

“Erin?” She begun hesitantly, slowly moving to place an arm on Erin’s shoulder. “Is something wrong?”

Erin fidgeted a little more, taking a deep breath as she glanced down at her feet. “I thought about what you said…” She spoke quietly, still scared any of the other team members might overhear. “About… the therapy thing.”

That surprised Abby, the scientist raising her brows at Erin. She hadn’t expected the physicist to put much thought into it, if she was being honest. She knew of Erin’s previous experiences with therapy, and she wouldn’t have been surprised if those had been enough to turn the physicist off to the idea forever. But here the redhead was, having actually  _ considered _ the idea. That alone was an impressive step in Abby’s eyes.

“And?” She asked slowly, her hand rubbing comforting circles on Erin’s shoulder. “What do you think?”

Again, Erin stayed quiet for a bit, as if trying to muster up the courage. Abby let her, realizing that pushing Erin in this state was the absolute worst she could do.

When Erin did speak up, Abby had to strain to hear her, the physicist’s voice almost too soft to make out.

“I think… maybe it’s not be a bad idea.”

“Erin!” Abby beamed at her, resisting the urge to pull Erin into a hug. “I’m so proud of you!” While she was excited, Abby managed to keep her voice at a normal level, realizing it may not be something Erin wanted to advertise.

Erin merely shrugged, clearly not thinking it much of an accomplishment herself, but Abby tried to let that slide, instead smiling reassuringly at her friend. “Really, this is a huge step, Erin. Is there anything I can do to help you?”

Erin nodded in response, finally looking up at Abby. As she did, the other woman could see the fear in her best friend’s eyes, something which - while expected - still broke her heart.

“Could you… Could you make the appointment?” Erin asked, her voice still almost impossibly quiet. “I mean, you probably have better things to do, but-”

Abby shook her head, interrupting her. “Erin, I’d be  _ honored _ to help you, okay?”

Erin nodded quietly, and Abby noted she still didn’t seem to convinced. And while it broke her heart that her best friend had been reduced to this, to someone Abby sometimes barely even recognized, she was incredibly happy Erin had chosen to take this step.

So she smiled at her, hiding her own pain in order to comfort Erin. “I’ll let you know if I’ve found something, alright? I’ll make sure they take you seriously there. In the meantime, do you wanna go back to Holtz?”

It was a suggestion, a comforting one, and Erin found herself nodding immediately. Abby shot her another comforting smile, assuring Erin it was going to be okay, before the physicist rushed back upstairs, back to the comfort of Holtzmann’s presence.

* * *

Just like during the previous days, Holtzmann did her best to make Erin feel useful and helpful as she worked. She asked her to hold this and that in place, claiming that she’d never be able to do this on her own, and shaking her head with enthusiasm whenever Erin looked doubtful at this praise.

“I mean it”, she reassured the physicist when once again, Erin didn’t seem to believe that she actually was useful, “these things would go poof way more often without your help. Also because I try to work more carefully, I don’t want to make something explode when you’re around and accidentally have you get hurt.”

It made Erin feel a bit weird that Holtzmann would be careful for her sake, but not for her own. She found herself wondering if this meant that the engineer valued her being fine more than being alright herself, but she didn’t know how to ask if this was true, and told herself not to be silly. Because certainly, it couldn’t be true anyway; why would someone as brilliant as Holtzmann care more for the safety of someone like her than for her own?

“You know”, Holtzmann went on in a casual tone as she moved wires and added screws, Erin watching her in fascination - it seemed so random, the way she worked, but it all always made sense somehow, in the end, “I’m totally going to steal that hoodie some day soon.”

This was the last thing Erin had expected to hear, and she looked quite confused, looking down at the hoodie before her gaze came up to meet Holtzmann’s again, her confusion clearly audible when she said “What?”.

“The hoodie”, Holtzmann confirmed, “I’m gonna steal it. It looks so soft and comfy and I bet it smells like you. Wait, let me check.”

She leaned closer and buried her face in Erin’s shoulder, then sniffed - loudly -, Erin looking at her with wide eyes when she pulled back again, blinking when Holtzmann gave her a wide, slightly manic grin.

“Yup”, the engineer then said, wiggling her eyebrows, glad when she got a tiny smile from the redhead for her goofy antics, “once again, The Holtzmann was right. Smells like you. Gonna steal it.”

“Um, okay”, Erin replied, figuring that she had no grounds to stand on about stealing clothes - she had been wearing the MIT hoodie quite a lot lately, after all. She also found that she didn’t really mind the idea of Holtzmann stealing her clothes, the physicist wondering just how cute the engineer would look in that hoodie.

_ She’ll probably look better in it than I do, _ Erin thought, finding herself smile just a little at the thought of Holtzmann in her clothes. The engineer seemed to notice as much, Holtzmann giving her another bright grin before she returned her focus to her work. Erin just watched her in silence, once more amazed at how kindly the other woman was still treating her.


	31. Chapter 31

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy Easter everybody! Hope your holiday weekend was a good one :)

“I have a surprise for you”, Holtzmann said early in the next morning, during breakfast. For a moment, Erin was weary and anxious, then reminded herself of how kind the engineer had been to her the past two weeks, and that the last surprise had turned out to be quite the pleasant footrub. She told herself that certainly, Holtz wouldn’t do anything to hurt her, not after how kind she’d been to Erin.  
  
“What is it?” she thus asked, unable to keep a bit of apprehension out of her voice. The engineer immediately picked up on it, giving Erin a calming smile and grasping her hand, sounding as if she was revealing the greatest secrets of the universe to her when she answered.  
  
“We”, she said, then paused for dramatic effect, “will go shopping today. If you feel up to it, of course.”  
  
“Shopping”, Erin echoed, making Holtzmann nod enthusiastically, a wide smile on her face.  
  
“Yup”, she confirmed, “shopping. You, me, and the Ghostbusters credit card issued by the government. And yes, before you ask, this has been approved.”  
  
“Oh”, the physicist let out, clearly not sure what to think of this. Once more, Holtzmann proved how well she could read her by now, giving her a warm and caring look as she squeezed her hand tenderly.  
  
“We don’t have to, if you don’t want to”, she let the redhead know, “we can just order some stuff online if you’d prefer that. But hey; it might be fun. And we can have lunch at the mall and go to Starbucks and stuff. Just you and me.”  
  
Erin somewhat liked the thought of such a day with Holtzmann, but part of her was frightened of leaving the safety of the firehouse. _Then again_ , she told herself, _she couldn’t hide away from the world in here forever,_ and she knew that she had to go out and get clothes at some point. She couldn’t keep borrowing Holtzmann’s sweaters forever.  
  
“We’ll go together?” she asked in a small voice, simply knowing that she wouldn’t be able to handle going on her own. As much as the fact that she’d need Holtzmann by her side for this made her feel bad and like a burden all over again, she was more than a little worried she’d run into Phil, or run into someone else who would point out just how pathetic she truly was. At least if Holtzmann was with her, she’d have some sort of safety net, someone who could help her if things got too much for her.

“And… and I’m not keeping you from anything important?” She continued, again not wanting to be a burden to Holtzmann. “You must have better things to do than going to the mall with me, Holtz…”  
  
“Nope”, Holtzmann gave back at once, earning a doubtful look, “so if you’re up to it, we can go whenever you want. Not that I mind you wearing my hoodies, but I imagine you’ll want to… restock.”

She could have smacked herself the moment she said those words, realizing too late that they would only serve to remind Erin of Phil and of the things the man had done to her.

Thankfully though, if it did make Erin think of that, it wasn’t bad enough to send her into another panic attack. She did briefly look down before she - with a force of willpower Holtzmann could practically see - forced herself to look up again and to meet her eyes, the engineer’s heart singing at this small, but important demonstration of inner strength.   
  
“Alright”, Erin said, and Holtzmann could tell how hard it had been for her to say this single word, smiling brightly at her as she exclaimed “that’s my girl!” And again, Erin was touched and a bit stunned by how different it sounded to when Phil had said it, the pride and joy in Holtzmann’s voice making her smile a bit while a blush coloured her cheeks.  
  
“If you’re sure you have time for it”, the physicist added, Holtzmann noting how she, despite the moment of showing that not all of her strength was gone, started doing the thing with her fingers again she always did when she was nervous or uncomfortable, “I don’t want to be the reason that your work suffers…”  
  
_I have important work to do, Erin,_ she heard Phil’s voice from one of the darker corners of her mind, _I don’t have time for your trivialities. Some of us are actually doing things which are useful for future generations, and are not busy hunting ghosts._  
  
“The only thing which will suffer if we do this is the credit card”, Holtzmann reassured her, smirking, “but that’s been approved, so, no problems there.”  
  
Erin wasn’t sure what to think of the government paying for her new clothes. She was quite sure that this wasn’t what the mayor had had in mind when he’d said they would get funding, and certainly, there were other, more important things this money could be used for… _but on the other hand,_ she then told herself, _Holtzmann looked so excited about going on this shopping spree with her,_ and if she already had talked to someone and had made sure it was okay…  
  
“Alright”, she made herself say, managing another small smile at how Holtzmann beamed at her yet again, “after breakfast, then…?”  
  
“Perfect”, the engineer beamed, then kissed her quickly, but tenderly, “let’s go have breakfast then, so we can hit the stores soon! Man, I can’t wait to get you all the awesome stuff you deserve.”  
  
Erin wasn’t quite sure she deserved any kind of stuff, awesome or not, but gave a brief nod anyway. Holtzmann smiled brightly, then grasped her coffee cup and emptied it with two big gulps, Erin looking at her in shock.  
  
“I’m eager to get done so we can go shopping”, the engineer told her with a small shrug and another smile. And even though she still wasn’t sure she deserved any of this, Erin found herself smiling back, finishing her own coffee and donut afterwards, part of her looking forward to the day out with the blonde despite her worries.  


* * *

  
  
Even though it was a weekday and before lunch, the mall was crowded. Erin felt nervous and anxious the moment they set foot inside, and grasped Holtzmann’s hand, just to reassure herself that she wasn’t alone, glad when the engineer’s fingers curled around hers at once, and gave her a reassuring squeeze.  
  
“Just tell me in case it gets too much and you want to take a break”, Holtzmann mumbled to her, keeping her voice low so no one around could hear, “and we don’t have to get it all today, we can go again another time. We’ll do this as long as you can handle it, okay?”  
  
“Okay”, Erin agreed, taking a deep breath. She told herself that she was a Ghostbuster - even if she hadn’t been on any busts in a while. And as a Ghostbuster, if she could handle ghosts attacking her and spewing slime all over her, she could certainly handle a bunch of people in the mall.

And unlike the ghosts, the people didn’t have any malicious intent towards her.  
  
Still, she kept holding on to Holtzmann’s hand, needing the quiet reassurance that the engineer was there. And as they walked to the nearest clothing store together, Holtzmann made sure to not let go of her, figuring that this might be a bit overwhelming for Erin after days in the firehouse with just the other Ghostbusters and the way Phil had isolated her before that.  
  
“Alright”, she said gleefully as they entered the store, “time to make this credit card glow. You want to start with some casual wear?”  
  
“Sure”, Erin replied, not quite sure what she wanted to start with. She wasn’t even sure she deserved any of this, let alone what she actually wanted to get.

She supposed letting Holtzmann lead the way about this couldn’t hurt. The engineer had been so kind to her the whole time - still was, in fact - and she didn’t want to annoy her by picking out clothes the engineer wouldn’t like.  
  
Holtzmann made her way to a stack of simple, uni-coloured t-shirts, suggesting a red and a blue one. Erin nodded along to it, something she kept doing even when Holtzmann got a bit more daring and offered her a flannel shirt, followed by one with a rather outrageous flowery print.  
  
Erin looked less convinced, especially at the last one, but still nodded, and Holtzmann started to have suspicions as to why she was agreeing with whatever she was suggesting. To find out if she was right, she began choosing more and more outrageous things, with the most awful, un-Erin prints she could, trying not to let her heartbreak show when the physicist just kept agreeing to everything.  
  
She took hold of her hand, and led her to a quieter part of the store, not wanting anyone of the other shoppers to hear, and thus keeping her voice low, as well, when she spoke up.

“Erin, my lovely cupcake. You do know that you don’t have to take everything I suggest, right? Because I’m me, and if you let me go crazy in here, you’ll end up dressed like me. And while I like the thought, I’m not sure it’s your style. You have a choice here, you know that, right?”  
  
Erin’s first impulse was to lie, to say that _Yes, she knew, and she was happy with what Holtzmann was choosing for her_ , just so the engineer wouldn’t get mad. Then she reminded herself of the fact that Holtzmann wouldn’t want her to lie to her, that she had been nothing but kind to her and certainly wouldn’t get mad at her for not wanting some of the items she had chosen.  
  
“Maybe”, she carefully started, still a bit hesitant, but reminding herself again that Holtz wouldn’t hurt her, “not… all of that are exactly… my thing.”  
  
“Alright”, Holtzmann smiled, to the physicist’s relief not mad at all, “lead the way, then. And remember, get whatever you like, the credit card is all yours.”  
  
Erin still felt bad about this, but she did try to do as Holtzmann had said. As they went from store to store, she chose several pairs of pants, to the engineer’s obvious delight, and a few shirts which were closer to her style than the abominations Holtzmann had found. She was still glancing at the engineer every now and then to make sure it was okay, and received a bright smile and a thumbs up each time.

She was feeling a little more at ease after leaving the third store, still with only a minimal amount of purchases done, Erin not wanting to spend too much of their funding on something as silly as clothes. As they walked, her fingers still intertwined with Holtzmann’s, her eyes fell on a dress in the window of another store, and her pace faltered a little.

She’d always been a secret romantic at heart - a trait she had hidden well all her life, and had hidden even better during her time with Phil, who hadn’t been big on romantic gestures - and that dress was exactly what she’d imagine she’d wear on the perfect date. It was long, probably would go all the way to her ankles, and had a cleavage cut so that it would nicely accentuate her breasts, but not give too much away.

Her faltering pace had not gone unnoticed by Holtzmann, who pulled them to a stop after she followed Erin’s line of sight.  
  
“Oh my Cheerios”, Holtzmann said, quickly figuring out what Erin was looking at, “you’d look so good in that. Please get that, Erin, please. The Holtzmann begs you.”  
  
“I don’t think I’d look good in it”, Erin mumbled, blushing a bit, “and it’s probably too expensive, anyway.” Still, she couldn’t quite bring herself to walk away just yet, her gaze falling on the dress one last time before she pushed herself into motion. “Let’s just go?”  
  
“Eriiiiin”, Holtzmann whined in reply, loud enough to make several people look at her, the physicist only blushing deeper as Holtzmann pulled at her hand, “please get it. Please? At least try it on so you can see how amazing you’ll look? Don’t make me go down on my knees and literally beg. You know I will.”  
  
“Please don’t”, Erin mumbled, wondering if blushing too much could give her a nosebleed or something equally unpleasant, “I’ll try it on, but I’m telling you, it won’t look good.”  
  
“I’ll be happy if you just try it on and let me see”, Holtzmann reassured her, feeling a bit bad for guilting Erin into trying the dress like this. But then again, she had seen the longing in the other woman’s eyes, and she knew there was no way in Hell Erin was going to allow herself to buy that dress on her own, no matter how good she’d look in it. As a result, Holtzmann was determined to make her get it, if only so she’d feel a bit better about herself.  
  
Erin gave her another doubtful look, but allowed Holtzmann to lead her into the store, before she went to find the dress in her size. She retreated into one of the changing booths with it, and once she had put it on and saw herself in the mirror, she had to admit that it did look better than expected. Still not good, sure, but it didn’t look as terrible on her as she’d expected it to.  
  
Still, she felt nervous as she stepped out of the booth so Holtzmann could see it too, convinced the engineer would admit that she’d made a mistake, that the dress _did_ look terrible on Erin. She almost expected the engineer to ask her if she was planning to pick up men on the corner looking like that, not even noticing that she nervously rubbed her fingers as she waited for the blonde’s reaction.  
  
She had expected several possible reactions, from neutral to negative to downright _mean_. What she hadn’t been expecting was for Holtzmann to stare at her with her mouth slightly opened, a look which only could be described as utter adoration in her eyes.  
  
“Holy Canoli”, Holtzmann said, looking at her as if she wanted to jump her on the spot and needed all her willpower to not actually do so, “Okay, you have to get that. _Have to_. It’d be a crime not to. You’re so, _so_ beautiful in this. I mean, you’re beautiful all the time, but that dress, _woooow_.”  
  
_Surely Holtzmann was exaggerating,_ Erin thought to herself, looking in the mirror again doubtfully. She really didn’t think the dress looked _that_ good on her. But the engineer still was looking at her as if she was the prettiest woman she had ever seen, bouncing from one foot to the other as she waited for her answer.  
  
“It’s too expensive”, Erin finally said, feeling bad at how Holtzmann’s face fell, because the least she could do after all Holtzmann had done for her was make her smile, “maybe we can find one a bit like it, but cheaper?”

Much as she hated to admit it, Holtzmann couldn’t deny she had been expecting this answer. She’d seen how Erin had done her shopping thus far, mainly sticking to the cheaper stores and the sales sections, clearly not wanting to be a burden. It was obvious the physicist was uncomfortable with the idea of the government paying for things she shouldn’t even have lost in the first place, and while Holtzmann understood her worries, it still broke her heart to see Erin like that. The entire point of this shopping trip had been to cheer Erin up, not to make her stress over not spending too much money.

Then something hit her. _Of course!_

“Wait a sec”, Holtzmann gave back, digging out her phone. Erin frowned, but said nothing, watching how the engineer dialled a number instead, then talked to whoever she was calling in a hushed voice. The blonde smiled a short while later, her eyes glinting with joy when she held the phone out to the redhead.  
  
“It’s Jennifer”, she let her know, earning a questioning look from the physicist, “she needs to talk to you for a minute.”  
  
“Okay?” Erin gave back, nervous, her hand trembling a bit as she took the phone. She told herself that certainly, it was nothing bad. Again, Holtzmann wouldn’t do anything to hurt her; she had been nothing but kind and patient with her so far, so certainly, she wouldn’t out of nowhere change that now.   
  
_She might, some day,_ Erin couldn’t help but think, _if you make her angry again like you did the other day. But then you’ll deserve it, and you didn’t make her angry now… Unless she’s angry about the dress…  
_  
Holtzmann didn’t look angry though, just grinning at her; and so, Erin held the phone to her ear, unable to keep a bit of a tremble out of her voice though when she said “yes?”.  
  
“Dr Gilbert”, Jennifer Lynch greeted her, sounding quite a bit friendlier than usual, “I hear there is an opportunity you’re having trouble accepting? I spoke to Dr Holtzmann, and I have to tell you, if you don’t spend at least a thousand dollars today, the Ghostbusters funding might be in danger.”  
  
“What?” Erin squeaked, shocked - with the dress included, they still barely reached half of that amount, and the last thing she wanted was to endanger the funding. For a moment, she wondered if perhaps Jennifer was joking; surely, Erin wasn’t worth over a thousand dollars in clothes. How did one even _get_ a thousand dollars worth of clothes, anyway? But she realized she couldn’t take that risk. Her friends might not be hating her now, but they certainly would if she caused them to lose their funding.  
  
“I’m sure Dr Holtzmann can help you reach that goal”, Jennifer said, voice growing even kinder when she went on, “do this for yourself, Dr Gilbert, you deserve it. Have fun.”  
  
Erin highly doubted that she deserved this, but didn’t dare talk back. Instead, she let out a vaguely agreeing noise, and apparently, that was enough for the PA, since she wished her a good day before she ended the call.  
  
“Um”, Erin said, giving the phone back to Holtzmann, who pocketed it at once, “guess I’m gonna get that dress after all… Not sure what I’ll wear it to, but…”  
  
“I might have an idea for that”, Holtzmann let her know, feeling a bit bad about guilting Erin into this, but telling herself it had been for a good cause, continuing when the physicist gave her a somewhat curious look. To Erin’s amazement, the blonde was actually blushing a bit as she spoke. “um… perhaps for a date night? A date with me, I mean. If you wanna.”  
  
“I’d like that”, Erin quickly told her, before she could overthink it and start questioning why Holtzmann would want a date with _he_ r, of all people - _they sort of were dating, after all_ , she told herself, _practically living together in the firehouse, sleeping in the same bed each night and sharing cuddles and kisses._ It might not be conventional, and Erin still wasn’t entirely sure just how she felt about Holtzmann, but the thought of a date actually made her feel all warm and fuzzy inside. _And if the thought of dating Holtzmann makes me feel that way, then surely it couldn’t be such a bad idea, right?_ “I… I’d like that a lot…”  
  
“Excellent”, Holtzmann beamed at her, the expression making her feel quite weak in the knees, “let’s get this stuff and find lunch somewhere? We can continue shopping after. Oh! We might even go to that outrageously expensive Oscar de la Renta store; apparently one shirt is like $600 dollars there. That should help you get your limit.”  
  
Erin nodded as Holtzmann joked about purposely trying to find the most expensive things in the stores, just to piss Jennifer off, knowing the engineer didn’t mean all of it. Especially when she knew Erin still felt like she was spending way too much money as it was. As Holtzmann kept joking around, Erin moved back into the booth to take the dress off, even smiling a bit to herself as she changed back into her own clothing, thinking of the date Holtzmann had suggested and actually daring herself to look forward to it.


	32. Chapter 32

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fair warning folks, there's a mention of dubious consent in this chapter, so if this is upsetting for you, tread carefully :/

It had been a good day, Erin realized as she and Holtzmann returned to the firehouse just as dusk was settling over the city. They’d had lunch, with Holtzmann making use of the fact that they had to spend at least a thousand dollars and ordering the most expensive thing on the menu. With those exact words, in fact, the engineer not even bothering to look what that actually was. Erin had eaten something light, of course, but had only ordered after she promised Holtzmann  _ not _ to look at the prices and simply at what she actually  _ wanted _ to eat.

After lunch, they’d gone to a few more stores and had bought more clothes, before stopping at Starbucks on their way home. The blonde was now carrying a paper bag with a pastry she had gotten and a paper cup with some ungodly mixture of coffee and syrups, while Erin had a simple cappuccino for herself.

As well as carrying the coffee and the little Starbucks bag, Holtzmann was packed with shopping bags, several of them dangling off her arms. Erin had tried to take a few from her, insisting that it wasn’t fair for Holtzmann to carry all this by herself, but the engineer had refused to let her, telling her that pack mule was part of her job description for the day and reassuring her that it was okay.

“Wow”, Abby commented as she saw them enter, raising an eyebrow at the number of bags Holtzmann was carrying, “looks like you were quite successful, huh?”

“Indeed”, Holtzmann beamed while Erin fidgeted a bit nervously, still feeling bad about spending all this money, but reminding herself of what Jennifer Lynch had said, “Erin bought the prettiest dress. Really, she looks  _ so _ good in it. Just the memory makes me all weak in the knees.”

Abby was absurdly happy to see Erin blush a bit at the compliment, just like she always had pre-Phil when Holtzmann had complimented her. The engineer brightly smiled back at her, then moved to the couch and dropped the bags onto it, a small smile tugging at the corners of Erin’s mouth when she turned to face her and was holding the brown Starbucks paper bag in her teeth.

“You could have said something”, she then said, stepping over to the engineer and taking the bag from her, “I would have taken it…”

“Certainly”, Holtzmann replied, making sure no bags would tumble off the couch before she opened the bag and pulled out what she had gotten, Erin finding herself swallowing heavily when she saw that it was one of the autumn edition apple-cinnamon muffins she had been looking forward to each year.

“Wanna share?” Holtzmann beamed at her, and even though she’d eaten a not exactly healthy lunch - having had way more bread to a salad with too much dressing - Erin found herself nodding, unable to say no to the smile and puppy-dog-eyed look the engineer was giving her.

“Yay”, Holtzmann said, then broke the muffin in two. The half she gave to Erin was visibly bigger than the piece she kept for herself, but Erin didn’t want to risk making her angry by pointing this out and just accepted it, unable to hold back a smile of delight after the first small bite she’d taken.

Abby watched with a slight smile, happy to see her friend somewhat relaxed for the first time in days. She’d purposely waited for the two of them to get back, and wondered if that had really been the right call to make. After all, Erin looked so at ease right now… Abby hated that she would probably ruin that for her. She knew that she had to, though - she might have failed her as a friend when Erin still had been in that mess of a relationship with Phil, but she was determined she wouldn’t fail her again.

Clearing her throat, she approached her best friend, unable to keep a bit of trepidation out of her voice when she spoke up. “Hey Erin? Can I talk to you for a bit?”

Erin looked up in surprise, but nodded nonetheless, Abby casting a look at Holtzmann that clearly said ‘alone’.

“I’ll just go put these away.” The engineer replied, picking up the bags that didn’t contain the dress as she bounded upstairs, leaving the two friends downstairs. Erin already seemed more nervous, something which made Abby’s hatred for Phil grow even more.

_ That asshole… How could he do this to her? How could he reduce her to this? _

But right now, that wasn’t the point. Abby sat down on one of the chairs across from Erin, folding her hands in her lap. “So, I found a therapist…”

Erin only became visibly more nervous at this, but still nodded; Abby took note of how her fingers started fidgeting, then made sure to meet Erin’s gaze with hers again, wanting Erin to see that there was nothing but warmth and genuine care in her eyes as she went on.

“She specializes in… people who went through what happened to you”, she said, avoiding it to say “victims of abuse” in the last possible moment, not wanting to upset Erin, “among other things, of course but… She seems to know a lot about… that. So I, um, I kinda went ahead and made an appointment.”

“Oh”, Erin let out, and for a moment, Abby wasn’t sure if she just didn’t dare to say that she wasn’t happy about this, or if she was genuinely thankful that Abby had done this for her. The suspicion that Erin wasn’t pleased only grew when the physicist’s gaze dropped down to the floor and her fidgeting increased.

She knew that it had to be done though, and so, she made no move to take it back, and after a few seconds, Erin’s gaze came back up, and Abby could almost see the force of will she’d needed for this simple act.

If Phil had entered the room in this very moment, she would have strangled him then and there, without remorse.

“Thank you”, Erin said, and even managed a weak smile, Abby unable to hide her relief as she smiled back. Erin had asked her to help with the appointment, but she knew that just doing so still had been a risky thing to do, considering the redhead’s state of mind, and she was glad that it hadn’t backfired.

“Um”, Erin let out, making the researcher focus on her again, “could you… maybe… come with me? I know you’re busy and that you have better things to do, I won’t be mad if you say no, I just…”

“Erin”, Abby interrupted her, not unkindly, reaching out to grasp her hand, “I’d love to come with you. Thank you for asking me.”

The physicist was quite sure that Abby indeed had better things to do, but was too relieved that she wouldn’t have to go there alone to question it further. She knew that Holtzmann would have gone without her, had she asked her to, but even in her current bad state, she was aware of the fact that Holtzmann would do pretty much anything to help her - even though she still wasn’t quite sure why - and also knew that, if she’d say on the way there she didn’t want to do this after all, Holtz would let her back out in a heartbeat.

And she knew that in this case, that wouldn’t be a good thing, because she had to do this, if not for herself -  _ she certainly wasn’t worth all that hassle _ , she thought to herself - then for Holtzmann.

“I’ll go with you”, Abby repeated, distracting her from her thoughts, “and don’t worry about the cost; I spoke to Jennifer Lynch and it’s been taken care of. Alright?”

Erin wasn’t quite sure that this was good use of their government funding - they were being paid to study ghosts, after all, and not to take care of her - but she didn’t want to repay the kindness Abby had shown by talking back, and so, she just swallowed her words and nodded, even managing another small smile afterwards.

“Thank you”, she said again, Abby squeezing her hand in response. And just then, either because she had sensed the talk was coming to an end or because she wanted to make sure Erin was okay, Holtzmann came sliding down the pole, beaming at the two as she let them know that she had taken care of the new purchases and that only the dress was left to unpack.

While Holtzmann unpacked the dress, Abby let them know she’d be heading home, leaving the couple in peace. “Have a good evening”, she added, earning a tiny smile and a nod from Erin. She smiled back at her friend, then headed out, leaving Holtzmann and Erin alone at the firehouse once more.

“What did Abby want?” Holtzmann asked casually, as she sat down next to Erin on the couch, the dress splayed over one of the lounge chairs for both of them to admire.

Erin froze a little at that answer, trying to think of the best way to tell Holtzmann she had agreed to go to therapy. While the blonde had promised her a few days ago that she wouldn’t hate Erin for the decision - and that, in fact, she thought it wouldn’t be a bad idea - the physicist was still nervous that Holtzmann hadn’t meant what she’d said.

“Was it about the same thing you two spoke about the other day? When you stayed behind after breakfast?”

Erin turned to Holtz when she said that, shock and worry clear on her face. “You knew I was talking to Abby?” She asked nervously. Holtzmann quickly smiled in response, carefully moving to place a comforting hand on Erin’s shoulder.

“You weren’t exactly being subtle, cupcake. But it’s okay; I figured if you wanted to tell me, you would have.”

The redhead nodded. “I swear I wasn’t trying to keep a secret from you, it’s just… I wasn’t sure…”

She was fidgeting again at this point, and Holtzmann moved to cover Erin’s hands with her own. “You don’t need to explain yourself to me, Erin. You’re entitled to your secrets, and I know Abby only wants to help you.”

Another nod from Erin.

“Remember how she mentioned therapy?” She spoke quietly, Holtzmann slowly nodding in response. “Well… I thought about it… And I think it may not be a bad idea to at least try it.”

Holtzmann had to admit she was a little surprised at the news, but she wasn’t about to shame Erin for it. She’d meant what she’d said; she wanted to support Erin in her decisions, whatever they might be. So she beamed at the redhead.

“I think that’s a wonderful idea.” Holtz smiled, earning her a grateful look from Erin.

“You’re not mad? And you don’t think I’m crazy?”

“Of course I’m not mad!” Holtzmann moved to place her arm around Erin’s shoulder, the physicist all but immediately leaning in. “And I most definitely don’t think you’re crazy. Honestly, Erin, I think it’s a great thing that you’re at least trying it. And whether or not you decide to continue with it, you’ll always have me. I’m not going anywhere unless you want me to.”

Erin felt herself relax at those words, glad for the confirmation from the engineer.

“So… You still want to date me?”

“Hells yeah!” Holtzmann beamed ,  making Erin look at her once more, the physicist taking another careful bite of the muffin while Holtzmann went on. “Getting to date you is one of the most awesome things in my life, if not ever. I’m honestly so lucky.”

Once again, Erin blushed, but the physicist had given up on contradicting Holtzmann about this. She still thought that the engineer was exaggerating, but after the nice day they’d had, she didn’t want to ruin the mood by pointing that out, simply moving closer to Holtzmann.

“So tell me”, Holtzmann said, “you want to go out for our date, or have it here? We can do whatever you prefer, but I’d like to surprise you, I just need to know where you wanna have it.”

“Um, here?” Erin shyly gave back, hoping she wasn’t making the wrong choice. As fun as the day out had been, it had been a little overwhelming, and while she enjoyed the thought of a date with Holtzmann, she wasn’t quite sure she was ready to have one in public. She felt quite relieved when the engineer didn’t appear annoyed or upset, the blonde merely grinning at her as she nodded.

“Here it is, then”, she said, folding and putting a pair of pants on the ever-growing stack of clothing, “Friday night? I have a few ideas, but I’ll need a bit of time to prepare them.”

Erin nodded, a bit nervous about Holtzmann’s ideas - she had to remind herself again of the engineer’s unwavering kindness towards her, and told herself that certainly, Holtzmann wouldn’t do anything mean or unpleasant, but still part of her remained anxious and worried… And then, as if that wasn’t enough, a new worry surfaced, before she could attempt to stop it.

_ She’s gonna expect something for that, you know,  _ a small but firm voice whispered from the depths of her mind,  _ making out and cuddling won’t be enough for her in the long run, she’ll want you to put out after that date. You sure you can do that for her? If you suck, she’s gonna drop you, or if that is all she wants from you, she’ll ditch you right after she got you into bed. _

Holtzmann picked up on the exact moment Erin’s mood shifted, and briefly paused and said the physicist’s name, giving her best to sound kind and calm, not wanting to upset her even further by making her think she was annoyed or angry with her.

“Erin?” she tried again when the redhead didn’t react at first, moving a bit closer to her and briefly touching her arm, placing her hand on the other woman’s shoulder when that brought no negative reaction, “what is it? Talk to me, honey, please.”

“I’m just… a bit nervous”, Erin mumbled in reply, realizing at once that telling Holtzmann about what really went through her mind would only make the engineer angry at her after all, either for assuming this or - which would be way worse - for Erin seeing through her plan to get her into bed, “I haven’t a date in a while which… wasn’t with… him.”

The way her gaze dropped to the floor as she said the last few words, and the way she started nervously rubbing her fingers together, made Holtzmann’s heart clench up, the thought that the mere mention of the man still could upset Erin like that forcing her to bite back anger at him yet again. She took in a slow, controlled breath to make sure her emotions wouldn’t show, because Erin would certainly think she was angry at her, only to nearly cringe as a thought she’d had a while ago was brought back to the surface by Erin’s words and behaviour.

She realized at this moment, that, even though she had been sure she’d never be able to just outright ask Erin about what was one of her biggest fears, she had to find out now, somehow. She wanted to make Erin happy with the date, but didn’t want to risk frightening her by saying or doing the wrong thing, and so, she had to know.

“Um”, she thus started, uncomfortable all at once, but unable to hide the fear she felt, even though she could tell it made Erin worry even more, “Do you have a moment? There’s something I… I have to ask. I really don’t want to, believe me, but…”

Even though she wanted to turn and run, Erin made herself nod, telling herself over and over that Holtzmann had been nothing but kind to her during this whole mess, and that she surely wouldn’t do anything to hurt her on purpose. She leaned in to Holtzmann, feeling the tiniest bit better when the engineer took tender hold of her hand, even though she worried again when she noticed that Holtzmann found it hard to look at her.

“Um”, the engineer said again, one hand coming up to nervously fiddle with her pendant; yet another sign for how uncomfortable she was.

“Did Phil ever… you know”, Holtzmann mumbled, sounding as if she was on the verge of tears all at once, “against… against your will?”

“Oh”, Erin let out, startled, not having expected this, of all things - and immediately worrying if her thoughts about Holtzmann wanting to sleep with her had been that obvious, “no. No! Oh God, no. He’d get annoyed if I wasn’t in the mood, but he never… He was considerate about it, he accepted that.”

Holtzmann felt so relieved she wanted to cry, but bravely bit her tears back. And even though Erin just had confirmed that her scumbag of an ex hadn’t actually raped her, the engineer found herself wondering how often the physicist had gone along with it despite not really feeling like it just so he wouldn’t be annoyed.  _ Because annoyance _ , she knew at this point,  _ always had had a chance to quickly turn into anger with him, and angry Phil usually meant that Erin ended up getting hurt. _

And she wondered how much longer he would have been so ‘considerate’, as Erin had put it, had they not gotten Erin out of the relationship. Holtzmann was pretty sure that sooner or later, Phil would have stopped caring what Erin wanted or didn’t want, and simply would have taken what he wanted when he’d felt like it, had the mess of a relationship between Erin and him gone on.

The mere thought made her sick to her stomach, and she swallowed heavily, taking in a deep breath to keep herself under control. Erin was looking at her in concern, and since she didn’t want to make the redhead feel bad, Holtzmann made herself smile at her, even though she could tell that it was more of a lopsided grimace than her usual radiant grin.

“Okay”, she said, Erin smiling back at her, a bit insecure,  _ but at least, _ she told herself,  _ she had been able to answer Holtzmann in a way which hadn’t made things worse _ , the redhead having purposely kept the parts from her where she’d sometimes had gone along with it when she hadn’t really felt like it, and that the sex had been completely about Phil, anyway. At first, she remembered, she had bothered to fake her orgasms, just so he wouldn’t feel bad, but had given up on that when she’d realized it didn’t make a difference, anyway.

And the few rare times he actually had managed to make her climax, Erin remembered, he had ended up criticizing her for being too loud, and she swallowed as she wondered if Holtzmann would say the same once they’d actually go to bed together.

_ Christ, Erin, I’m trying to be romantic here. How do you think I’m supposed to do that when you sound like a porn star? _

“I’m glad”, Holtzmann said, distracting her from these thoughts, “also because that means I don’t have to blow up his car after all. Cause if he had done that to you, hoo boy.”

Not quite sure what she could reply to this, Erin just gave her a slightly wry smile and a small shrug. Holtzmann smiled back at her, then took hold of her hand and gave it a brief, but tender squeeze, brightening up again the second she felt Erin’s fingers curl around hers.

“Alright, then”, the engineer then said, almost absent-mindedly running her thumb over Erin’s knuckles and making her smile widen a bit at the tender caress, “shall we put this awesome new dress somewhere safe?”

Nodding, Erin came to her feet again, prompting Holtzmann to do the same. Together, they carried all the new stuff up to the second floor, even as the unpleasant topic of Phil and what he might have done to Erin sooner or later still lingered on Holtzmann’s mind. The engineer vowed that she’d make sure Erin would have the best date ever on Friday night, just so she could forget about what the man had done to her for a short while.


	33. Chapter 33

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter has a brief mention of physical abuse, so just a little heads-up for you guys :)

Sitting in the waiting room, Erin felt more than a little grateful for the fact that Abby had joined her on this outing, pretty sure she wouldn’t even have set foot inside had she been forced to do this alone. If she was honest, she’d much rather have had Holtzmann with her, but they had unanimously agreed that the engineer was more than a little biased when it came to Erin’s well-being. If Erin didn’t want something, it was more than likely that Holtzmann would make sure Erin didn’t have to do it, no matter how beneficial it might be to her treatment. Abby was more capable of looking at the situation objectively, and so she was the better choice to join Erin on her first meeting.

Clasping her best friend’s hand, Erin still felt sick to her stomach as she sat there, waiting for her name to be called as Abby tried to distract her with a personality quiz she’d found in one of the magazines lying there. (Apparently, Abby was a Summer type person. Erin supposed that made sense).

“Miss Gilbert?”

Both Erin and Abby looked up at the mention of Erin’s last name, the two women glancing at a kind, elderly-looking woman standing a few feet away. Erin nodded, hesitantly getting up from her chair, Abby following her as she walked towards the woman.

“That’s me.”

The woman smiled at them, holding out her hand for Erin to shake.

“My name is Diana Goodman, one of the counselors here at the Ross Center.”

“Erin Gilbert.” The redhead replied, her voice trembling a little as Abby gave her hand a comforting squeeze. Noticing as much, Diana smiled kindly at the brunette.

“I see you’ve brought someone with you?”

“Um”, Erin let out, a look of trepidation on her features. Diana made a mental note of how the redhead started fidgeting nervously, the woman clearly thinking that she had done something wrong.

Also having noticed the look on Erin’s face, and the way her friend had tensed up, Abby took a slight step forward, as if to shield the redhead, clearing her throat and making the therapist look at her when she spoke up.

“Abby Yates. The person I spoke to on the phone assured me it was okay for her to bring someone.”

“Of course it is.” Diana replied. “It’s not unusual for people to bring someone to their first meeting here, usually as a source of comfort. In fact, I highly encourage it, especially if it makes you feel more at ease.”

The woman gave Erin what she hoped was a calming smile, and the redhead nodded, even though she still looked nervous. Abby gave her hand another squeeze, earning a weak smile from her best friend, both of them looking at Diana again when the therapist asked if Erin felt ready to go to the office.

Erin wasn’t quite sure she actually did, but she knew that stalling wouldn’t help a bit, and so, she made herself nod again, the older woman giving her another smile in response before she asked them to follow her, then.

As she led the way, Abby kept holding on to Erin’s hand, eager to make her more comfortable. She could feel that the physicist’s palm was sweaty, but at least Erin didn’t look as if she wanted to turn and run anymore.

“I made the appointment,” The researcher said, more to break the silence than out of a real need to tell Diana this, “because Erin’s had some… unpleasant experiences with therapists before. That is mostly why I am here with her, too.”

“Unpleasant experiences?” Diana echoed, with a brief look at Erin.

The physicist gave a small shrug, not quite willing to tell this woman - who might be a therapist, but was still a complete stranger - about that part of her life, and thus keeping her answer rather vague.

“Bad childhood experience.” She mumbled, glad when the therapist just nodded and didn’t pry. She figured that, if it would be important to help her get better, it’d be brought up again later, but for now Diana clearly was satisfied with that answer, and her lack of prying made Erin feel a bit better about her.

Diana gave her another calming smile, signalling that this topic was indeed dropped for now. When they reached her office, she let them enter first, offering them a seat before she took one herself and quickly explained what they would actually be talking about during this first meeting.

“The point of this meeting is for me to gather information on the situation; make an objective analysis, as it were. I need you to know I’m not here to judge, and we can stop at any time, but the more information I have, the easier it would be to get you the best treatment possible.” Diana smiled at them, opening a notebook as she did. “I’m here to help you, Erin. That help includes not pushing you into talking about things you don’t feel ready to talk about, alright?”

Erin nodded, still a little nervous about the situation.

“Okay, so, the file tells me you’ve just gotten out of an abusive relationship, and that this has begun affecting your day-to-day life. Can you tell me more about that?”

Diana leaned back into her seat, looking relaxed and comfortable, a pose which was supposed to make Erin feel the same way, the way how Erin shifted nervously on her seat showing though that it wasn’t quite working, her gaze dropping to the floor as she answered.

“I’m not sure I’d call it an abusive relationship…” The physicist mumbled in response.

_ After all, people who were in abusive relationships,  _ she reasoned internally,  _ had something happen to them which was awful and which they didn’t deserve. And certainly, she’d deserved the things Phil had done to her, for making him angry and not being the good girlfriend she should have been for him. _

“It was.” Abby interjected, but Diana shook her head, effectively shushing Abby. The older woman had been in the business long enough to know that it was usually best for patients to come to their own conclusions about their situations, especially in the beginning.

“But you did just get out of a relationship, is that right?” She asked calmly, turning her attention back to Erin.

“Yes. With Phil Hudson.”

Erin wasn’t quite sure why she added his name. It wasn’t like Diana knew him - as far as she knew - and as she said the words, she could feel her stomach clench in fear, as if just saying his name would be enough to have him burst through the door and start yelling at her about talking to complete strangers about how pathetic she was.

_ You don’t really think anyone cares about this, do you, Erin? I’m the only one who’ll ever care enough, and even I think this is pathetic. _

“Can you tell me a little more about that?” Diana distracted her from those dark thoughts and from Phil’s voice echoing through her mind. “How did the relationship start?”

Erin shrugged, then nodded, finding it hard to look the therapist in the face though as she replied.  _ She’ll notice how pathetic you are, and how good he tried to be to you, and you just made him angry all the time. Then she’ll tell you she can’t help you and you should go back to him. Or she’ll ask you how an alleged genius could end up in such a situation. _

She forced those thoughts aside, telling herself it wasn’t true, that these thoughts were part of the reason why she was here. Diana gave her a warm, encouraging smile, and after another moment of collecting herself, Erin started to talk. Her speech was halting and soft at first, the nerves apparent. Only when she realized the therapist didn’t look as if she was judging her in any way did she begin speaking with a bit more confidence.

“We’d been dating… before,” the redhead told her, “when I still worked at Columbia. There was a bit of a break-up in between, but he asked me out again shortly after the Times Square incident... “

“Why did the first break-up happen?” Diana asked, taking notes as Erin spoke.

The physicist gave another brief shrug, nervously toying with the hem of her blouse as she answered.

“I’d gotten fired from Columbia.” She told the therapist, at the same time realizing that she’d never told Abby about this particular anecdote, glancing at her for a second before she went on, “And he… I don’t know, he sort of just watched how I carried out my stuff. And he… well, he acted like he didn’t hear me. Or know me. I don’t know. I just ignored his calls after that and he came to see me at our old headquarters, and that talk ended badly, I just walked off and left him standing there, so when he came to the firehouse, and asked for another chance, I figured I’d owe him that much…”

Diana nodded along to that, and took more notes. Erin wondered what exactly she was writing down. She didn’t dare ask though, glancing at Abby when she felt the other woman squeeze her hand again, a bit relieved to see just concern and warmth in her best friend’s gaze when their eyes met.

(Had she been able to read minds, she would have been given quite the detailed, graphic image of Abby strangling Phil with his own stupid v-neck after what Erin just had told, but Abby knew better than to let her rage at the man show through her features.)

“Apart from ignoring you after you got fired,” Diana said once Erin had fallen silent again, “would you describe him as supportive? During the relationship?”

“Um… I think so?” Erin gave back, not quite sure how to answer this, “I mean he… he’d say he was just looking out for me when he… pointed out things I was doing wrong. Things like how I dressed and acted and… everything.”

And it had been pretty much everything Phil had criticized about her, Erin realized as she said those words, not sure what to think about that. Back then, she had believed it - had believed that Phil was just doing this to help her better herself - but during the time she’d been with Holtzmann, the engineer not once had made that sort of comment towards her, no matter if it came to how she dressed or what she ate or how she acted. Not even when she had woken the blonde up with her screams in the middle of the night, Erin recalled, had Holtzmann said anything which hadn’t been caring and truly supportive.

_ Had he really been supportive, then?  _ she wondered, Abby quietly sitting next to her and holding on to her hand.  _ Or had it been something else? Something I’d only believed to be supportive, but in reality… _

She swallowed heavily, but pushed those thoughts aside, instead telling Diana some more about the relationship.

She told the therapist how they had moved in together pretty fast (“Holtzmann made a joke about how it was fast even for her, and she has a subscription to U-Haul”), how he had helped her to get rid of some clutter when she’d moved in with him (“It was just stuff I wouldn’t need anymore, anyway”), and how he always had told her he was just looking after her when he got annoyed at her for not taking his calls or texting back fast enough to his liking.

Diana kept nodding along, and kept taking notes, always making sure to keep her attention on Erin. She asked some more about how Phil would show his support, the things he had said to her, then asked the question Erin had been afraid of.

“And did he ever hit you?” The therapist asked.

Her eyes and voice were kind, not a hint of judgement coming through, but Erin still felt pathetic and like a failure as she gave a brief nod. She quickly specified, not wanting to give the impression that he just randomly had struck her for no good reason.

“Sometimes. Never when I didn’t deserve it.”

She could feel Abby tense up next to her, and the researcher’s hold on her hand tightened a bit. She made no comment though, even Erin could tell that she wanted to when she briefly glanced at her.

Abby knew that Phil had hit her, of course, but she had no idea how often she actually had been annoying enough to make him do so.

Erin wasn’t sure she wanted her friend to find out.

“Can you tell me what he’d say to you in those situations?” Diana went on, still perfectly kind and caring.

Erin still found it hard to speak, a thick lump in her throat as she glanced at Abby, not wanting her to realize how awful she had been to make Phil hit her, his annoyance when she had woken him up in the middle of the night with her screaming flashing through her mind.

_ Like a child, wailing after a nightmare. Jesus, Erin, you’re a grown woman A scientist. Act like one! _

Diana immediately picked up on how Erin tensed up, and the way she looked at Abby told her all she needed to know. She cleared her throat, making the physicist look at her again, the kindness in her voice never wavering when she spoke up. “Would you be more comfortable if Abby waited outside?”

Erin nodded, glancing apologetically over at Abby. She felt bad for wanting her friend to leave the room; Abby had come here with her to support her even though she certainly had better and more important things to do, and here she was now, repaying her for this kindness she certainly didn’t deserve by refusing to talk while she was in the room.

But she didn’t want Abby to know it all, not if she could help it. If Abby realized how terrible she had been, how often she had provoked Phil into hitting her…

“Abby, I’m sorry,” she started, feeling on the verge of tears all at once, “I really am but…”

She could barely believe it when Abby, not looking annoyed or upset the slightest, smiled at her and shook her head, then placed one hand on her arm, no annoyance in her voice either when she replied.

“It’s alright, Erin. I get it.”

Erin moved to defend herself, but Abby shook her head.

“Abby, I’m really sorry.” Erin still repeated, all at once finding it hard to look her in the eye. Abby patted her arm reassuringly and told her again that it was alright, hiding the fact how much this actually hurt quite well from the physicist.

They had been best friends before this whole mess, she remembered that well. There had been a time when they had told each other everything. And now, Erin couldn’t even trust her enough anymore to speak of the abuse she had suffered while she was in the room.

_ And I have no one to blame for that but myself _ , Abby realized, a lump forming in her throat as well. Because if she hadn’t been so blinded by her own paranoia and fears and insecurities, things never would have gotten this bad, and they wouldn’t even be in this place right now.

She couldn’t even blame Phil, not for this. Because it had been  _ her _ who hadn’t seen. It had been  _ her  _ who had yelled at Erin and had kicked her out, exactly when the redhead would have needed her the most. It had been  _ her _ who hadn’t put a stop to this when she could, and in this very moment, she felt as if she might as well have hit Erin herself.

She didn’t even want to imagine how much extra pain she had caused the physicist with how blind she had been.

“It’s okay, really”, she made herself say, glad that she managed to keep her voice steady, “I’ll wait outside, alright? I’ll be right there in case you need me.”

Erin nodded, and Abby gave her another smile before she left the room. For a moment, she considered staying close to the door and try to eavesdrop, then she nearly smacked herself; this would be the worst thing she could do, and if Erin somehow found out, she’d never trust her again.

_ No, _ Abby decided, she’d wait somewhere where she wouldn’t hear anything. She’d have to work on getting Erin’s trust back, so she’d actually be deserving of the physicist telling her one day, once she felt comfortable enough around her again.

As she walked a few steps down the hallway, she got out her phone, toying with it as she waited to be called back in, or perhaps to be told that the session was over. As she did, she wondered if Holtzmann knew the full extent of what had happened to Erin.

She was quite sure that the engineer at least knew more about it than Patty and she herself did, but even though she badly wanted to know too, just to be sure how badly she had failed as a friend, she knew that asking the blonde wouldn’t lead anywhere.

Holtzmann certainly wouldn’t tell her, but would advise her to ask Erin directly if she wanted to know.

As if the engineer had somehow sensed that Abby was thinking of her and was in a position to write back, the phone buzzed in her hand as she received a text, making her jump. Thankful for the distraction, Abby pushed the button to display it, smiling a bit at what Holtzmann had written.

_ Holtz: Hey. How’s it going?? _

_ Fine, _ Abby texted back, deciding not to reveal that she just had been more or less kicked out of the room,  _ Erin is talking to the therapist alone now. The woman seems alright. _

_ Holtz: She better be or I’ll kick her ass _

Abby smiled again at that and shook her head, then reassured Holtzmann that there was no need to kick anyone’s ass. They texted back and forth for a while, then the engineer let her know she had to get back to work, and Abby kept busy with one of the many games on her phone until finally, the door to the office opened and Diana told her she could come back inside.

She could tell at once that Erin had been crying at some point during the talk, her eyes red and a tissue crumpled in one hand. She knew better than to ask, though, and simply moved to sit next to her and grasp her hand again, glad when the physicist managed a weak smile in response to her tender gesture.

“This has been a very productive first meeting.” Diana told them, with a calming smile at the redhead, “Erin, my team and I will discuss the situation and the next steps, and figure out the best treatment. This is a standard procedure, to ensure that you will get exactly the help you need, alright?”

Erin nodded at that, figuring that the woman knew what she was talking about. The fact that Diana had shown nothing but kindness to her during this meeting and apparently believed her what she was saying made it easier for her to agree as well, and she told herself that she could do this.

“It might help”, Diana went on, making the physicist focus on her again, “if you had a second meeting like this one with another therapist. Two objective points of data will be helpful for deciding the best way to go forward from here, and you will have the option to choose which counsellor you want to do this with. As for now, I’d suggest individual sessions twice a week, focusing on cognitive behavioural therapy. I imagine my colleagues will agree about this, but it still won’t hurt to have another set of eyes look at this.”

Erin just nodded again, not sure what other response she could give. Diana smiled at her and put her notebook away, and that apparently was some sort of signal that their time for now was over.

Erin wasn’t sure if she should feel relieved or not when she got up from the chair.

“Thank you, Dr Goodman”, Abby said, shaking the woman’s hand with a small smile. Erin echoed the words of gratitude, sounding soft and absent-minded though, as if she was already thinking of something else, barely looking around as she followed Abby outside and to the car.

“So?” Abby asked, once they both had gotten into the vehicle and she was carefully driving out of the parking spot, “what do you think…?”

Erin seemed a bit startled, as if she had been lost in thought. She shrugged, then managed a weak smile, glancing at her friend even though Abby had to keep her focus on the road and couldn’t look back at her.

“I think it’s going to help.” She said, earning a brief smile from the researcher, “and… It really helped that you were there with me. Thank you. Sorry again for making you leave at that one point…”

“You have nothing to be sorry for.” Abby reassured her, making use of a red traffic light to look at her, and to reach out and briefly touch her arm, “It’s okay, Erin, it really is.”

Erin gave her another tiny smile, then the traffic light switched to green and Abby had to focus on driving again.

As she did so, Erin looked out the window, her brow furrowing as she thought back to the moment she hadn’t been able to talk about Phil hitting her in front of Abby, that fact somehow having lingered in her mind ever since she’d clammed up in Diana’s office.

She thought back to the college days with Abby, the time when she had told her everything, no matter how embarrassed or anxious it had made her feel. It made her heart clench up when she realized that this trust had been lost somewhere along the way.

She knew that this could be put down to their ten year radio silence, but if Erin was being honest with herself, she knew that wasn’t the case. Since the portal incident, the two had grown significantly closer, and even before then Erin had been more than eager to share details about her life with Abby.

For the first time since she had gotten out of that mess of a relationship with Phil, Erin realized fully that she indeed had changed. She wasn’t quite sure if this had been caused by Phil, or if it was actually her own fault, but she was determined to make it undone.

Erin wanted to go back to who she used to be. She wanted to do this for Holtzmann, so she could be the girlfriend the engineer deserved, and for Abby, so they could be the friends again they had been before everything had gone bad. And more than that, she realized, she wanted to do this for herself too, all at once quite sick and tired of feeling so anxious and bad and unhappy with herself all the time.

There had been a time in her life when she had felt better, after all, when she had rushed in first to bust ghosts and had felt proud of all she had accomplished. She wanted to feel that way again, so it’d be actually justified when Holtzmann looked at her as if she had hung the moon.

Erin figured that this wouldn’t be a short journey, or an easy one, but she told herself that she could do this. Diana had seemed friendly enough during their talk, also when they had been alone in the office. And unlike the therapists of her childhood, who had claimed that she was just seeking attention and making things up, Diana appeared to believe her and take her seriously whenever she spoke.

_ I can do this _ , she told herself, while Abby grumbled about New York traffic and loudly thought about using their distinctively un-American siren to be faster,  _ I helped saving this city, so certainly, I can handle therapy and talking about… whatever it was that changed me. _

They made it back to the firehouse in a reasonable timespan - Abby did not use the siren after all, even though she was sorely tempted to - and even though she had told herself that she could do this, that she  _ had  _ to do this, Erin was in dire need of Holtzmann’s mere presence by the time she got out of the car, mumbling to Abby that she’d be upstairs in the lab before she all but ran to the door.

As it turned out, she didn’t even need to go upstairs to get the comfort she longed for. Under the pretence of talking to Kevin, Holtzmann was right there in the reception area, and Erin barely gave her time to register her presence before she was right in front of her and wrapped both arms around her, burying her face in the blonde’s shoulder and inhaling her scent. She felt herself relax immediately when Holtzmann returned the embrace and rubbed her back soothingly.

“Hey cupcake”, the blonde murmured into her ear, while Abby moved past them and gave her a small smile, hoping it would signal that it had gone well and that Erin wasn’t about to break down crying or something equally unpleasant, “how did it go?”

“It was… okay”, Erin gave back, not sure how much she wanted to reveal, especially down here, where the others might hear, “I think I might go there, they might be able to… help. She was really nice…”

“Happy to hear, love”, Holtzmann beamed at her, and she looked so proud and happy that it nearly made Erin tear up again. She managed another smile, one with a bit more conviction this time, once more telling herself that she could do this and that it would be okay; for Holtzmann, for her friends, and for herself.


	34. Chapter 34

The days until Friday night were spent mostly calm, with Holtzmann and Erin spending most of their time up in the lab. Abby and Patty were pretty much tiptoeing around them, as neither of them wanted to say the wrong thing considering the atmosphere was still rather tense after their argument.

Erin, of course, picked up on this, and unsurprisingly felt bad about it. She didn’t want to burden her friends and make them walk on proverbial eggshells whenever she was around.

If Holtzmann noticed this too, she didn’t mention it to the physicist, instead opting to talk about their upcoming date night, simultaneously distracting Erin from her therapy meetings. By spending large parts of the day promising her one of the best dates she’d ever had, she had managed to make Erin smile quite a few times, something which the engineer felt quite proud of.

To get supplies for said date, she had to leave Erin alone at the lab a few times, something neither of them liked. Erin bravely told herself each time that Holtzmann hadn’t actually left her for good, and that she’d be back, but she was still unreasonably relieved each time Holtzmann did come back. The engineer was often carrying bags when she returned, winking at Erin as she told her to not peek, and that the things in them were a surprise.

Erin still felt weary of surprises, but reminded herself again and again that whenever Holtzmann had told her she had a surprise for her, it had been something good. As a result, she managed to keep calm, even though this got more and more difficult as Friday came closer.

For one, she had no idea what to expect from the date. Holtzmann had told her that all she had to do was be there and wear the amazing dress she had bought, and that she’d take care of everything else. THis included the food, a fact which made Erin a bit weary of the whole thing.

That worry was a minor one, however, considering her worries about what Holtzmann might expect from her  _ after _ the date. She felt nervous each time she thought of the possibility that the engineer would make the sort of move she had gotten to expect from Phil whenever he had taken her out to dinner, wondering how Holtzmann would react if she wasn’t satisfied by her performance.

Or worse; if she said no altogether.

_ You know she’ll expect this from you _ , the treacherous little voice of her anxiety whispered to her in the dark of night, fed and nourished all too well by what Phil had done to her,  _ and then what? If you say No, she’ll leave you. If you go along with it, and suck, she’ll also leave you. And that is if you’re assuming that this wasn’t just all she was after in the first place. If all she wants from you is sex, then she’ll definitely leave you after that ‘date’ _ .

Every single scenario Erin could think of ended with Holtzmann leaving her as soon as the date was over, and the mere thought of that made her heart clench up. By the time Friday evening rolled around, she was fairly certain that her fears clearly showed through her features when Holtzmann asked her if she was ready for their date, the knowledge that the night would end with her alone and Holtzmann mad at her weighing heavy on her heart.

Of course Holtzmann immediately picked up on Erin’s discomfort, looking concerned and sounding quite worried when she repeated her question. “You know…” She added hesitantly, “We don’t have to do it if you don’t feel up for it.”

“No, it’s okay.” Erin made herself say, fighting through her worries. She didn’t want to disappoint Holtzmann, the physicist reminding herself of all the work the blonde had done for this, and of the errands she had run the previous days. She couldn’t waste all that by cancelling now, no matter how uncomfortable she felt. “I’m just… a bit nervous. I’ll go get changed?”

“Alright”, Holtzmann said with a toothy grin, “meet me downstairs in fifteen?”

The physicist nodded, earning yet another bright smile before Holtzmann practically dashed off, her energy and enthusiasm making her smile a bit as well.

_ It’s going to be fine, you know this _ , she told herself as she went to change, meanwhile thinking back to how positively Holtzmann had reacted to the dress, _ she promised she would never do anything to hurt you. _

Still, it was hard to silence the anxious voice in her mind, even as she changed into the date night dress and applied some light make-up. She briefly wondered if she should do anything with her hair, then decided against it, figuring that letting it fall down onto her shoulders would suffice.

To her dismay, Erin realized that she had gotten done faster than expected, still having a few minutes left until she’d meet Holtzmann downstairs. Not wanting to go down too early, too afraid she’d mess something up, she fidgeted nervously on the spot for half a minute, then sat down, trying not to wrinkle the dress, and grabbed the first book she got her hands on. It was one of Holtzmann’s volumes on engineering, and even though this wasn’t truly her field, Erin understood enough of it to keep herself busy until finally, it was time to go downstairs.

She took in a deep breath as she made her way to the stairs, telling herself that she could do this, and that surely, it would be fine. Still, she had to take a few more deep breaths to keep herself calm before she could finally make her way down the stairs.

Once she had made it down, her breath caught in her throat for reasons much more pleasant than anxiety and panic, and for a few seconds, Erin could only stand there and stare. She wondered how Holtzmann had gotten all this done in just fifteen minutes, the physicist looking absolutely gobsmacked. The engineer just smiled brightly, proudly standing next to her handiwork.

“Oh wow”, Erin spoke breathlessly, finally finding herself able to say something. Clearly pleased about this reaction, Holtzmann beamed at her, then walked over to where she was standing and offered her arm to the stunned redhead with a flourish.

“May I take you to your seat, my Lady?” she asked, Erin still feeling a little breathless as she nodded and took Holtzmann’s arm. She glanced at the blonde as she let the engineer lead her to the table, quite positively surprised by how well Holtzmann looked.

Clearly eager to match up to Erin’s elegant dress, the engineer had put on a well-tailored suit, complete with button-up shirt, vest and tie. Her hair was its usual mess of bun and curls, but she made it work, Erin finding herself quite impressed by her look.

And as if that wasn’t enough, Holtzmann had gone all out with preparing the dinner date. There was an abundance of food waiting on the table - chicken and pasta and bowls of salad and bread rolls - and for the right mood, the engineer had dimmed the lights and had placed several candles in between the dishes.

“There’s wine in the kitchen and beer and sodas chilling in the fridge, whichever you prefer.” Holtzmann let her know as she led her to the table, then pulled the chair out for her. “May I take your drink order, my dear?”

“Um, wine would be nice.” Erin replied as she sat down, looking in awe at the spectacle Holtzmann had prepared. “Wow, Holtz, you really worked hard for this…”

“I didn’t make the food though, just so you know.” Holtzmann let her know, “I want to give you an awesome date, not diarrhea. There’s dessert waiting in the fridge as well. I’ll be right back.”

She winked, and quickly but gently kissed Erin on the cheek before hurrying off to the kitchen to get the wine. As she sat there, looking at the result of Holtzmann’s hard work, Erin felt nervous again, the small, treacherous voice piping up again from the darkest corner of her mind.

_ You know she didn’t do all this just to be nice, right? _ it whispered, just a hint of Phil’s voice mixed in,  _ you know this. She definitely expects you to put out for that. Better use the time until after dinner to get used to the thought. _

Feeling anxious once more, Erin nervously started fidgeting on the seat, then forced herself to sit still as she heard Holtzmann come back. The engineer smiled at her as she entered the room again, carrying two glasses of red wine and having the bottle beneath her arm, ruining the impression of perfect waitress a bit with that as she put one of the glasses down in front of Erin, then moved to sit opposite of her.

“To our first real date”, the blonde said once she had gotten comfortable, raising her glass. Erin did the same, and Holtzmann took note of the slight tremble of the other woman’s hand. She held back the urge to frown though, knowing that the physicist would immediately interpret this as Holtzmann being annoyed or angry with her. She didn’t want to ruin their date night like that.

“To our first real date”, Erin echoed her, taking a sip of wine afterwards. Part of her seriously considered getting drunk, or maybe at least seriously tipsy, just to get through the rest of the night. Erin theorized that perhaps, if she wasn’t quite sober, she’d be able to handle Holtz wanting to sleep with her better. But she had never been one to get wasted, and Erin was certain the younger woman would notice that something was amiss if she started chugging down the wine like lemonade.

“So”, Holtzmann stated once she had put the glass down, “for starters, I got salad with tomatoes and mozzarella. May I?”

She gestured at the salad bowl, and Erin gave a quick nod. Holtzmann beamed at her, then filled two small salad bowls, handing one of them to the physicist and wishing her a good appetite.

They ate in silence for a while,  _ but at least, _ Erin thought to herself, _ it didn’t feel uncomfortable _ . She felt a bit bad about eating like this when after the salad, they moved on to the chicken and the pasta. She was still more than a little self-conscious about her weight, but she was constantly reminded of all the work Holtzmann had put into this, and she didn’t want to appear ungrateful. So she ate it all, delighting in the way Holtzmann kept beaming at her.  _ And really, if it made Holtzmann smile like this, how bad could it be? _

“This is really good,” she said after taking the first bite of the main course, genuinely smiling at Holtzmann. It was prepared just the way she liked it - just another indicator for how much thought and work Holtzmann had put into this, “thank you for doing this for me. I’m having a really good time.”

“My pleasure, hot stuff.” Holtzmann told her at once, smiling brightly at her, “Happy you like it. But don’t forget to leave room for dessert, alright?”

The thought of dessert made Erin feel quite bad about eating all of this again, but she bravely hid it, once more telling herself that Holtzmann had gone to so much trouble for her and that the least she could do was to enjoy it.

“You know,” Holtzmann went on, having picked up on Erin’s slight dismay about the rich food and eager to distract her, “if you want, we can go for a walk after eating? Just around the block or something, if you like. Get some fresh air?”

Erin didn’t really feel much like going out, but she was aware that she had been mostly cooped up in the firehouse since Phil left her, only going out for their shopping trip and her latest therapy appointment. She knew that this wasn’t exactly healthy. So she bravely made herself nod, even though she was a bit surprised about this suggestion from the engineer, having been quite sure up to this moment that Holtzmann would want to move this to the bedroom right after they’d finished eating.

_ Well, you’ll just go to the bedroom a bit later, then,  _ the small, nasty voice whispered to her,  _ you don’t really think she’ll do all this without expecting anything, do you? _

The food seemed to turn into a ball of lead in her stomach, and she swallowed heavily. Her hand trembled when she picked up her glass, hoping that a few sips of water would help with her sudden dry throat. It was enough for Holtzmann to notice her discomfort, though, the engineer putting her cutlery down in response and giving her a worried look.

“Erin,” she spoke hesitantly, reaching over the desk to grasp the physicist’s free hand, “what is it? Is something wrong? Talk to me, please.”

“I know what you’ll want from me for all of… this.” Erin replied, swallowing back her tears as she made a vague gesture at all the stuff on the table. Fighting back the tears took some effort, but she told herself that she just had to stop being childish and that it certainly would be ungrateful to cry in front of Holtzmann now.

_ On the other hand,  _ she realized, her obvious discomfort at the thought of sleeping with the engineer only would make it clear to Holtzmann what a horrible person she truly was. That she only had been using her after all, and didn’t really feel anything for her, and Holtzmann would leave her and kick her out of the firehouse and she’d be all alone, just like she had feared she’d be when she’d ended things with Phil…

“Erin,” Holtzmann said in alarm, having noticed at once how the redhead’s breath had started to quicken and the tremble of her hands had increased, a clear sign for the beginnings of a panic attack. She hurriedly got up from her seat and moved around the table to put one arm around Erin’s shoulders, her heart clenching up at how tense the physicist was. She wondered if Erin had been thinking about this the whole time, had been afraid of Holtzmann practically dragging her to the bedroom after this during the entire date.

“Erin, cupcake...” she said again, rubbing her arm and shoulder tenderly, hoping this would help to calm her down, as it had before, “All I want is to make you happy, Okay? I’m not doing any of this because I have some… I dunno, hidden motive, or whatever. I just want to make you feel good.”

Erin gave her a look of disbelief at that. Certainly, Holtzmann hadn’t gone to all this trouble with no sort of payback in mind, and “I want to make you happy” seemed like a somewhat insufficient motivation for all the engineer had done to make this date night a nice one. Dates with Phil had been going out for lunch or dinner. The man certainly never had done as much as Holtzmann had for a date, and he always had expected…

_ She’s not Phil, though,  _ a small voice reminded her. The same voice which had told her that perhaps, therapy might help her find her strength again, and that she could be the girlfriend Holtzmann deserved.  _ And she’s been nothing but kind to you since this whole mess started. She’s never expected anything from you in return. If she says she had no hidden motives, she had no hidden motives. _

“I’m sorry,” she brought out in a trembling voice, unaware that she made Holtzmann’s heart clench up with her words, the engineer by now having lost count of how many times Erin had apologized to her for what basically amounted to nothing requiring an apology, “I just thought… I don’t know, I’m sorry…”

“You have nothing to apologize for,” Holtzmann reassured her, even though she knew that this wouldn’t be enough to remove Erin’s constant fears of having done something wrong, and wouldn’t take away the need to apologize, “and I’m not expecting anything for this. Okay? Like I said, I just want you to be happy, that’s all I had in mind when I planned this.”

Erin still looked a bit doubtful, but at least she was calming down again, the panic subsiding. Giving her a hopefully calming smile, the engineer leaned closer to briefly, but gently kiss her cheek, then gestured at the vague direction of the kitchen, somehow managing to sound enthusiastic and light-hearted despite her own worries. She felt bad for not having made it clear that she expected nothing - and certainly not sex, for this date - the engineer now wondering if Erin had been agonizing about this the whole time, and wanting to smack herself for not having picked up on it sooner.

“So,” she said, with another bright smile, “shall we go get dessert, then? I heard that the place where I got all this stuff from has the best tiramisu in all of New York. We should go find out if that is true, no?”  
  
“Okay”, Erin gave back, managing a weak smile of her own. Holtzmann took a moment to kiss her cheek again, then straightened up and hurried off into the kitchen while Erin nervously played with her napkin, oddly relieved that Holtzmann apparently didn’t expect sex - or anything else apart from her happiness - from her. Still, she was once again unable to shake the feeling that she was only using the blonde to get better. And no matter how hard she tried to push them aside, these thoughts kept nagging on and on at the back of her mind.


	35. Chapter 35

A few days after the first meeting with Diana, Erin had the second intake talk with the other counselor, as the older woman had suggested. Said counselor was nice enough, but Erin had felt much more comfortable with Diana, and chose to have her as her therapist, agreeing on individual 1-hour appointments twice a week, as recommended. And so, a week after her first talk with Diana, Erin was back in the therapist’s office, having her first official therapy session. Abby came along with her again, but didn’t go inside with her this time, instead spending the hour in the waiting room. In the office, Erin, at Diana’s request, talked about the beginning of the second relationship with Phil, about how happy she had been and how charming he had been.

Diana mostly listened this time, simply letting Erin talk. She asked her a few questions every now and then, whenever Erin fell quiet, but the redhead managed to get through the session without bursting into tears again as a result.

When she left the office once the session was over, Erin felt quite good about it, once more sure that this had been a good idea indeed. Abby immediately took note of Erin looking much less nervous than she had when she had gone into the office, and smiled as she asked her how it had gone. She was quite glad when Erin smiled back at her and told it had gone quite well.

“Great!” Abby smiled, making the redhead nod, “Shall we go get a coffee before we head back to the firehouse?”

“Sure.” Erin replied. In all honesty, she didn’t really feel like going anywhere other than back to the firehouse, but she didn’t want to appear ungrateful after Abby had made time to go with her yet again and had spent an hour basically sitting around waiting for her.  _ And, _ she reasoned, she could get Holtzmann a little surprise snack there, too, Erin well aware of how much the engineer loved the cinnamon rolls Starbucks offered.

Abby gave her yet another smile, then they both got into the car. The next Starbucks wasn’t far away, and the line was thankfully somewhat short, so soon, they were back on their way to the firehouse, Erin drinking a cappuccino (no sugar) and holding a little brown bag with a cinnamon roll in her lap, smiling to herself as she thought of Holtzmann’s reaction to the little gift.

It wasn’t much, especially not compared to all Holtzmann had done for her since the whole situation with Phil had started (and especially the things she’d done for her after that relationship had ended), but she figured that a small way to show Holtzmann that she appreciated her was better than nothing at all. A small way to show her that she liked her, and everything the engineer had done and was doing for her, even if it was just a pastry.

By the time they made it back to the firehouse, the coffee was gone, and she ditched the empty paper cup as they walked inside. This time Holtzmann was up in the lab rather than waiting for her at Kevin’s desk, but when Erin went upstairs to join her, it was quite obvious that the engineer still had been anxiously waiting for her return. When the physicist came upstairs, it was clear Holtzmann was not - and had not been -  not doing any actual work, the engineer simply staring at a bunch of blueprints and looking over at the stairs the moment Erin’s footsteps were audible.

“Cupcake!” Holtzmann exclaimed enthusiastically, dropping the work she hadn’t been doing anyway to head towards Erin.

The physicist smiled back almost automatically, then held up the bag. She was a bit hesitant to say what had flashed through her mind at Holtzmann’s words, but tried telling herself that the engineer wouldn’t get angry at her for it. After all, she hadn’t even gotten angry when Erin had woken her up in the middle of the night because of a stupid nightmare, so a harmless little joke certainly wouldn’t cause a bad reaction.

“Actually, no”, she thus said, holding up the brown paper bag so Holtzmann could see it, “cinnamon roll.”

Holtzmann blinked, clearly not having expected this at all - before she laughed, and Erin felt her heart swell, her own smile widening as she walked over to the engineer and handed the bag to her.

“Cinnamon roll!” Holtzmann practically cried, Erin’s smile widening at the happy reaction, happier than she had been hoping for, “Awesome! Thanks so much, hot stuff. You want to share?”

“It’s yours.” Erin replied, not really surprised - at this point, she believed Holtzmann would share her food with her even if she herself would be close to starving, but she was not really sure if it’d be a good idea to eat this, unaware that this was Phil’s poison still spreading through her mind, “I shouldn’t…”

“Please?” Holtzmann said, giving her the puppy dog eyes Erin had  _ never _ been able to say no to, “Let me share my favourite snack with my favourite person. This is too good for me to eat alone.”

“Okay.” Erin gave in rather quickly, knowing she wouldn’t be able to withstand that puppy dog look for long anyway; Holtzmann beamed at her, then unwrapped the cinnamon roll quickly, nearly tearing the paper in enthusiasm. Erin smiled a bit at her antics, even though she felt bad again when Holtzmann broke the pastry in half and handed the slightly bigger one to her.

“Thank you.” She replied quietly, deciding it was better than protesting, not wanting to argue with Holtzmann over something as silly as food. The engineer beamed at her, taking a bite from her own half, and once she had chewed and swallowed, she cried “Cinnamon smooch!” and planted a hearty kiss onto Erin’s lips, delighted when the physicist let out a small giggle in response.

“You have the cutest giggle I have ever heard”, Holtzmann told her, smiling brightly, her delight only growing when Erin blushed a bit in response. The engineer tenderly kissing one of her reddened cheeks before she leaned back against her workbench, getting comfortable while Erin took a careful bite of her pastry.

“So, how was it?” the engineer asked, making the redhead look at her, “If you want to tell me about if, of course. If not, it’s okay too, alright?”

“It was… okay, again”, Erin told her, making her smile a bit again, “Diana’s really nice, she mostly let me talk this session about… you know, about the start of the relationship. With him. I think it’s… not a bad thing to keep doing this, so I’ll stick to the appointments for now, twice a week…”

“I think that’s a great idea.” Holtzmann nodded, earning a somewhat shy smile from Erin, the physicist up to this moment still having worried that Holtz might think she was weak, pathetic, crazy, or all three for continuing with this. “And I’m so proud of you for doing this. That’s my girl!” Holtzmann grinned, enthusiastically kissing her cheek once again.

Erin felt herself smiling at that. She had heard Holtzmann utter the statement a few times now since they had started dating - the physicist figuring that she could call this that now, what with them having had an actual date - but it still made her feel strangely giddy and proud and happy, feelings she never had had when Phil had said the same words to her.

Her smile widened slightly as Holtzmann beamed at her, then she took a careful bite of her cinnamon roll half. Holtzmann, clearly not worrying about crumbs, pretty much tore into it, happily sighing “so good” once she had gulped down the rather big bite she had taken.

“You’re the best for bringing me this.” she added, beaming at the physicist again. Erin smiled back at her, touched by how happy the engineer was about the small gesture, reacting so differently to how Phil always had when she had tried to do something nice for him.

It stunned her a bit how different the engineer acted from her ex all the time, with such kindness and patience and sweetness. Again, she felt happy and proud, feelings she suddenly just had to express, doing so by stepping closer to the blonde and kissing her, the taste of cinnamon and sugar only making the already tender kiss sweeter.

“Hmmm,” Holtzmann hummed after they had pulled apart again, eyes sparkling, “that was even better than the cinnamon roll.”

Erin blushed a bit at this, finding it somewhat hard to believe, but she did not want to ruin the moment by contradicting Holtzmann. And so, she just smiled and kissed her again, pastry forgotten as she felt one of the engineer’s arms snake around her waist and pull her closer, the blonde’s obvious happiness convincing her further that it had been a good idea to give the therapy a try.

* * *

As she had during the past days, Erin spent most of her time up in the lab with Holtzmann, helping her the best she could in between her own work. She still suspected that Holtzmann didn’t actually need her help, and only was doing this to make her feel useful and better, but she was thankful for it nonetheless.

She only made her way downstairs to refill their coffees, but much to her surprise, the pot was full when she came to the kitchen. Before she could ask Abby or Patty if they had made fresh coffee - usually, after all, it was all gone at this time of the day, and she had to make more - Kevin appeared in the doorway leading to the kitchen, looking a bit bashful as he smiled at her.

“I, um, I know you usually get more coffee for Holtz and you at this time,” he told her, scratching the back of his head as Erin looked at him in confusion, “but normally it’s all gone so I made new one for you. And for Holtzmann.”

“Thank you...”, Erin replied, not quite sure what to think of this.  _ Was her state so obviously bad,  _ she wondered,  _ that even Kevin was noticing? Or was he just trying to be nice for no special reason, but simply because he could? _ Erin supposed that, if he had done this because she was in such a dismal state that even their somewhat dimwitted secretary noticed, it really was a good thing she had agreed to therapy. After all, half the time Kevin didn’t even seem to notice when the phone on his desk right in front of him rang, so if even  _ he _ had picked up on the changes in Erin’s behaviour...

“Welcome, Boss Erin!” Kevin beamed, then moved back to his desk. Having him call her Boss made her heart clench up, as she realized that - apart from helping out Holtzmann - she hadn’t done much actual work for the Ghostbusters since the relationship with Phil had ended. She wondered if she should have corrected him, should have told him that she wasn’t really part of the team anymore and that there was no reason for him to call her that...

Her mood sank at that thought, but she gave her best to push it out of her mind as she fixed their coffees, not wanting to make Holtzmann worry about her by coming back upstairs looking all worried. She stirred Holtz’ coffee, as always a bit stunned at the ungodly amount of sugar the blonde insisted she needed in her beverage, then made her way back up to the lab, carrying the cups carefully, not wanting to spill anything.

As she made her way up the stairs, she could hear Holtzmann talk and Patty laugh in response to whatever the engineer had been saying. It made her feel a bit better to know that apparently, Holtzmann wasn’t angry at Patty anymore. The blonde had been a bit reserved with the historian for a few days after that one dreadful evening when Patty, in an attempt to help, only had made things worse by nearly talking Erin into breaking up with Holtzmann.

“...so once this baby is finished,” Holtzmann was saying as Erin reached the top of the stairs, “capturing the ghosts should be a bit easier, once the proton streams have weakened them. I’m gonna call it the HoltzHold. It’s like a sort of grappler to hold the ghost in place.”

She beamed at Patty, then at Erin as the physicist moved to stand beside her and handed her the coffee. Holtzmann took the cup from her with a “thanks, cupcake” and a kiss to her cheek, Erin feeling a bit better when Patty’s only reaction to the pet name and the display of affection was a smile directed at both Holtzmann and her.

Both Erin and Holtzmann then took a sip from their coffees, almost simultaneously, and Erin had to fight to not spit it back out right away. Judging by the way Holtzmann’s eyes went big behind her tinted glasses, it wasn’t just Erin who didn’t like the taste, the engineer swallowing with visible difficulty, sticking out her tongue afterwards and letting out a “blargh” sound which made Patty laugh out loud.

“Kevin made that coffee,” Erin mumbled once she had gulped down her mouthful, putting the cup down onto Holtz’ workbench, “and now I suddenly remember why we asked him to stop doing that.”  
  
Only when Holtzmann stared at her in surprised delight and Patty bellowed out another laugh, Erin realized that she had sounded a little snarkier than she had intended - and a  _ lot _ snarkier than she had in months. And just as that realization hit her, Holtzmann started to laugh as well, pulling her in for another kiss. The physicist was smiling a bit once they had pulled apart again, all at once feeling good and relaxed, that brief flash of her old personality just another indication that things were slowly, but finally getting a bit better.


	36. Chapter 36

A few days went by, days during which Erin went to her therapy sessions and helped out Holtzmann at the lab. Even though their time together was calm, and filled with casual touches and brief but tender kisses, Erin found herself wondering again and again if she actually was still part of the team. Had Abby, Patty, and Holtzmann unofficially welcomed her back? Or were they just taking pity on her, and would this only last until she had gotten better, when she was again well enough to function on her own, without having Holtzmann around constantly to help her through panic attacks and keep her occupied?

There had been busts ever since the relationship with Phil had ended, but Erin had been in no state to even  _ think _ about going on them with the team. Now, though, Erin realized that she was beginning to miss going on busts, and that she missed how busting ghosts had always made her feel; strong, powerful, as if she could do anything if she just put her mind to it.

She missed that feeling more than she had expected. And so, for the first time since Abby more or less had fired her, Erin felt forlorn as she watched the rest of the team get ready after they had been called to another bust, all at once wanting nothing else than to join them, but not even daring to ask.

_ You know what they’re gonna say, _ a treacherous voice whispered at the far back of her mind while the other three pulled on their coveralls,  _ they’re gonna remind you that you’re not part of the team anymore, that you only get to stay here with Holtz so you won’t end up as a pathetic homeless beggar. They just pity you. They don’t want you on the team anymore, Abby told you so herself. _

Holtzmann, of course, took note of the look on Erin’s face, and saw the quiet longing and need to be useful in the physicist’s eyes. She was certain that the other would have seen it too, had they paid attention; Erin had never been very subtle.

She knew, though, that it wasn’t her place to ask Erin if she wanted to come along, not after what had happened between Erin and Abby. If Holtzmann asked her to come along, Erin would feel more useless than anything, convinced she’d only be allowed to come because the engineer had asked. If the request come from Abby, however…

Holtzmann shot Abby the most pointed look she could manage, tilting her head just a little to indicate the researcher take a look at her best friend. Abby, to her credit, caught on quickly and cleared her throat, knowing all too well what Holtz was getting at.

“Um, Erin?” she then said, not quite sure how to voice this. She could have simply said “you coming?”, but she feared that this might end up taken the wrong way, her mind racing as she tried to figure out the perfect phrasing.

“You know...”, she finally said, while Erin looked at her a bit like a deer caught in the headlights, clearly not sure what to expect, “from what that client told, this might be a Class IV. We could probably really use all hands on deck for this one. Do you want to join us?”

She wanted to add that it would be alright if Erin didn’t feel up to it, but one look from Holtzmann made her hold that part back. Belatedly, she realized  _ why _ it had been a good thing she hadn’t said it - certainly, in her current state of mind, Erin would have taken this as a subtle dig at her ability to come along, or maybe even as a ‘subtle hint’ that Abby didn’t want her there. If so, she would undoubtedly have ended up saying No, even though it was painfully obvious that she wanted to come, especially judging by the way her face lit up at Abby’s question.

“...are you sure you want me to come?” Erin asked after a few seconds, the pure joy dampening slightly as she thought back to the things Abby had said to her just before she had kicked her out. Smiling warmly, Abby nodded at once, then saying exactly what Erin needed to hear, the redhead’s face lighting up again in response.

“Of course”, Abby told her, Holtzmann and Patty nodding enthusiastically, “you’re a Ghostbuster, Erin. The team’s not complete without you.”

Erin almost teared up at that, but bravely bit the tears back, telling herself that crying certainly would make her look weak and pathetic again, and cause the others to change their mind about having her come along. Knowing that she’d cry after all if she tried to say anything, she just smiled and nodded, then hurriedly came to her feet and practically rushed to her locker, Holtzmann beaming at her eagerness to get changed and come with them.

Not wanting to make the others wait longer than absolutely necessary, Erin didn’t bother to take her clothes off, and just pulled the coveralls on over them, briefly hoping she wouldn’t get slimed. She did miss going on busts, but she certainly did not miss the gross sticky substance sliding into literally every crack, for a moment wondering if the slime had targeted someone else on the busts she hadn’t been on, or if the dubious honour of being slime target nr. 1 would always just be hers.

Feeling truly excited for the first time in weeks, Erin zipped up up the coveralls, then practically hopped into the black rubber boots. When she turned to join the others, Holtzmann was holding out the holstered proton shotgun to her, a twinkle in the engineer’s eyes which showed that she was as happy about Erin coming along as Erin herself was about going.

“Your shotgun, my Lady”, she said, with a tone and flourish which made it sound as if she was offering her a ride in a horse-drawn carriage and not a weapon to blast ghosts apart. Erin felt quite giddy when she accepted it and strapped it to her thigh, her heart skipping an excited beat as she felt the familiar weight hang from her leg.

“Packs are in the car”, Holtzmann added, holding back a worried comment about Erin’s ability to actually carry said pack. The physicist had put on a bit of weight since she had started living at the firehouse with Holtz, and had clearly regained some of her strength as a result, but she was far from the shape she had been in before the whole mess with Phil. But the last thing Holtzmann wanted was to make Erin feel inadequate, and so she bit back her worries and told herself that she’d simply have to keep a close eye on the redhead during the bust, just to make sure nothing would go wrong.

_ Even if Erin perhaps might not be able to finish the bust,  _ Holtzmann thought to herself as they made their way to Ecto-1,  _ it was worth it to have her going with them. _ The physicist was practically radiant as they got into the car, Holtzmann as always behind the wheel and Erin - after a brief look at Abby to make sure it was okay - riding shotgun. The engineer was almost surprised that the physicist wasn’t vibrating with excitement while she drove out of the garage, siren blaring, but decided it wouldn’t have mattered either way. She hadn’t seen Erin quite this happy in a long time, and she hoped to god this was just going to be the first of many times she got to see this look on her face.

It wasn’t far to the bust, which Holtzmann decided was probably a good thing;  _ if they’d had to drive an hour there, Erin might have spontaneously combusted,  _ she thought to herself, touched by how excited Erin looked.

The physicist practically jumped out of the car the moment Holtzmann had parked in front of the house they had been called to. The other three got out as well, and Holtzmann was the first at the trunk, pulling the proton packs out one by one and handing them out. The weight was as familiar as the shotgun strapped to her thigh when Erin pulled hers on, the sensation of the pack settling on her back strangely feeling like coming home, even though it did feel heavier than she remembered.

Not wanting to let this deter her, she told herself that she could do this, focusing on Abby as the researcher gave them a quick briefing. The ghost, according to the client, mostly appeared up in the attic, preferably at night when the family living in the house was sleeping, and nearly had caused injuries at least once by scaring the client’s wife so badly when she had been planning to stow things in the attic that she almost had fallen off the ladder leading up to it.

Before Phil, Erin would have been the first to rush in the moment the information had been given, but while she was excited to be on a bust again, she didn’t quite feel confident enough at this point to do so. Instead, she let the others go in first, Abby taking the lead with Patty right behind her, and Holtzmann hanging back a bit so she could stay close to the physicist.

As they entered the house and made their way to the attic, Erin felt the fine hairs on her arms rise and her ears popped. From the smirk Holtzmann shot her, she had felt it too, and Erin was nearly bouncing on her feet with excitement as they approached the ladder leading up to the attic.

All four of them heard the ghost before they could actually see it.

“Okay, we can only go up one by one, which sucks.” Abby commented, already pulling on her proton puncher., “I’ll go up first. Patty, I want you with the Ghost Chipper right behind me in case it comes flying at us and I miss it. Erin and Holtz, you bring up the rear, alright?”

Both the engineer and the physicist nodded their agreement, and Abby took a moment to smile at the redhead, touched by how happy Erin looked. Then, she made sure her weapon was ready before she climbed the ladder, Patty right behind her.

Apparently, the ghost had decided though that simply rushing at them would do no good, either aware that it was outnumbered or trying to set up some sort of trap. All four of them made it up to the attic without the ghost rushing at them, but they knew it was up here somewhere, feeling its presence in the heavily ionized air.

“Come out, come out, wherever you are”, Holtzmann said in sing-song, making Erin smile at her. She looked so at ease, so much like her old self, that for a few moments, the engineer almost thought she had fallen asleep at her workbench and was just dreaming all of this. It was almost as if the whole mess with Phil never had happened. And even though the engineer was happy to see the physicist like this, it also made her heart clench up, because she knew that the moment the bust would be over, all the damage Phil had done would be right back at the surface.

Pondering these things was somewhat distracting, but she didn’t let them distract her completely from the job at hand. She heard the ghost a second before saw it, spinning around just in time as it came rushing at them from behind, its jaw unhinging as it got ready to spew slime.

And it was aiming right for Erin,  _ because of course _ , Holtzmann sourly thought to herself.

She remembered all too well how Erin had reacted the last time she’d gotten slimed, when she still had been with Phil - she could still hear Erin say  _ I’m disgusting _ in her nightmares - and she wasn’t willing to let the physicist’s first bust back end like this. And so she moved, eager to shield her from the slime, noticing from the corner of her eye that Abby and Patty were hurrying to her side, clearly having the same idea, even though she wasn’t sure she ever had told them about the panic attack Erin had had the last time she had gotten slimed.

The three of them just had a second to make sure that Erin was safely shielded by their bodies, then the ghost started spewing slime at them, and the sticky green goo indeed went everywhere. Holtzmann tried to shield her face the best she could, not wanting to get the stuff into her nose and mouth. She was thankful for her glasses as they kept the stuff from ending up in her eyes, knowing that Patty wasn’t so lucky when she heard the historian curse harshly next to her.

It seemed to take ages until the slime stopped raining down onto them, but finally, the onslaught stopped, and Abby made use of the brief period of reprieve this gave them. The proton puncher made the familiar pow sound when she slammed her fist forward, and the ball of energy hit the wailing apparition square in the face, sending it a few feet back, giving them enough time to ready their proton wands.

Erin moved to stand next to Holtzmann, giving her a short glance, wanting to thank her and the other two for shielding her from the slime, but knowing that now was not the best time to do so. Instead of wasting precious seconds, she aimed her proton wand along with the others, and not even five seconds later, the ghost was caught up in four streams, wailing in distress now.

“Trap ready in three...two…”, Holtzmann started the countdown, reaching for said trap with one hand and sending it sliding over the ground until it was as close to the apparition as possible, slamming her foot down onto the switch to open it as she bellowed “one!”. Not long after, the ghost had been wrangled into the trap and she hurriedly shut it, smiling brightly at Erin afterwards, unperturbed by the slime dripping from her hair and clothes.

“The four of us”, she then said, holstering her proton wand, “just put another ghost in a box!”  
  
Erin’s eyes lit up at that, and she smiled so brightly that it made Holtzmann’s heart sing - and then, she threw both arms around the engineer and pulled her into a tight embrace, not caring about the slime the slightest, feeling better and happier than she had in weeks.


	37. Chapter 37

The therapy sessions Erin now went to twice a week caused a slight change in routine for all four Ghostbusters, most noticeably for Holtzmann and Erin herself. Holtzmann tended to adapt her work to things Erin could be helpful with - either via calculations or via some hands-on work - and Erin made sure to plan her work around the meetings, making sure she had nothing too mentally taxing planned for the hours after her therapy appointments. The physicist had quickly learned that the meetings were more emotionally draining than she had initially expected.

But while Erin still spent most of her time up in the lab with Holtzmann, as the days turned into weeks they all could tell that the work the physicist did with her therapist was slowly but steadily starting to have an effect. The pace of it frustrated most of them, though. While they had been aware the damage Phil had done wouldn’t vanish overnight, not even with the help of the apparently quite skilled Diana, it still killed them to see Erin this way, still only a shadow of her former self.

She still flinched whenever someone made thoughtless movements too fast towards her face or body, and was generally skittish around everyone, but this seemed to be happening less and less. The Ghostbusters - even including Kevin - were all mindful of their movements around her, and after a while, Erin no longer looked like she wanted to run away the few times they did slip up. She was eating more, too, joining in with whatever else the others ended up ordering for lunch. Sure, her portions were still significantly smaller than anyone else’s, but it was better than the ‘rabbit-food diet’ she had been on before, as Patty had dubbed it. And while she still needed prompting to join them on busts, they could all see Erin was slowly beginning to feel like part of the team again, all of them delighting in the look of pure, unadulterated joy on the physicist’s face the first time she blasted a ghost to oblivion again.

Yes, the progress was minimal, but at least it was there. They could see Erin was taking small steps towards becoming more like the person she had been before Phil had started working his poison into her mind, and it made them all hopeful that all these steps would eventually culminate in the old Erin coming back to them, or at least an Erin who had been as vibrant as the person they had come to know and love when the Ghostbusters had first started.

That wasn’t to say there weren’t some mistakes made on both their parts. Abby had ended up yelling at Benny over another soup delivery while Erin was in the room, and it had taken Holtzmann a good half an hour to talk the physicist out of a panic attack, the blonde glaring at Abby all the while as she assured Erin Abby wasn’t mad at  _ her _ . Multiple times, they had slipped up and asked Erin to stop crying, and while the statement had been born out of concern rather than anger, it still only served to make Erin feel worse. And while Erin claimed to be fine, she had already collapsed under the weight of her proton pack at least once, making it clear that even physically, she still had some recovery to do.

It was the latter Erin felt worst about, knowing she could have put the team in serious danger had she collapsed at a less opportune time, but she hadn’t wanted to bother them with her ‘complaints’ about not being able to keep up, much too scared they’d end up firing her again after all. She already felt terribly about the fact that everyone had to walk on eggshells when she was around, lest she burst into another crying fit or get another panic attack. But whenever she voiced those concerns, Holtzmann was quick to reassure her that it wasn’t her fault, and that she shouldn’t feel sorry, and that they were all  _ happy _ to adapt if it meant Erin felt safe and welcomed and at home.

Holtzmann made sure to remind her of this whenever she saw Erin stiffen or even flinch at a too quick movement. Even so, Erin was amazed and astonished to find Holtzmann kept up everything else she had done for her since she had ended up practically living at the firehouse. The engineer kept being endlessly patient and kind with her, always eager to make sure she was feeling good and safe, and more than once, Erin found herself wondering how much longer Holtzmann would be able to keep this up.

If it was taking a toll on the engineer, she didn’t let it show, the blonde being energetic and enthusiastic as she always had been about her work. As they worked in the lab together, Holtzmann made use of her seemingly endless supply of jokes, cheesy one-liners, and dance moves, and each time she managed to make Erin smile or even giggle she’d beam at the physicist so happily that it warmed the redhead’s heart.

With her regular therapy appointments, a new routine soon was added to their lives. Now that Erin had realized that she indeed needed to help to come to terms with what had been done to her, she no longer tried to avoid going to the meetings, making it possible for Holtzmann to accompany her instead of Abby without the fear of Erin backing out of appointments.

There were moments, of course, when Erin still wanted to turn and run, but she bravely fought through those, and Abby had instructed Holtz to not let her skip out on an appointment no matter what. It was difficult for the engineer at times, when Erin was clinging to her hand with sweaty palms and fear in her eyes, but she knew that it was necessary that Erin stuck to her appointments, for the physicist’s own sake. She had asked Erin once, back at the firehouse, if she was certain she didn’t want to break Abby’s rule just once, but the physicist had disagreed, telling Holtzmann that she  _ wanted _ to do this, even just for herself.

“He changed me, Holtz. He hurt me, and he changed me, and I don’t like it. I don’t like those meetings, but I like who I am now even less. I need this, I think… I  _ hate _ that I need this, but I don’t want to feel like this anymore.”

Those words had broken Holtzmann’s heart, but she understood completely, vowing to herself she’d make sure Erin got the help she needed. And even though it hurt her sometimes, she always encouraged the physicist to follow through in those moments it seemed too much for her, calming her down and grounding her until Erin felt ready to face whatever the oncoming therapy session would bring.

There was another big plus for having Holtzmann take her there - whenever she was done with the session, the engineer would take her out to make her feel better, provided Erin felt up for it. The talks with Diana often left her drained and mentally exhausted, but Holtzmann knew how to make that better every single time, making sure she got the physicist’s mind off things by distracting her with simple pleasures.

Her method was simple, but effective. Whenever Erin wasn’t too drained to do so, Holtzmann took her on little dates after her therapy session, ranging from getting Starbucks together to having lunch or a snack. If Erin felt too tired, Holtz would drive them back to the firehouse, calling for take-out and watching Netflix on the couch with Erin snuggled up beside her. More often than not, those dates ended with the physicist falling asleep on her shoulder, a sight which never failed to warm Holtzmann’s heart.

One memorable time, they went to the zoo, where Holtzmann made faces at the monkeys through the glass barrier until Erin, for the first time in months, was giggling so hard that tears were in her eyes, and pleading with Holtzmann in a breathless voice to stop, before she’d end up in dire need to use the washroom.

“That one monkey looks like Mayor Bradley”, Holtzmann said in response, pointing out said monkey, one of the elder specimens. And just as Erin started to calm down and looked at the animal Holtzmann was talking about, the monkey lazily scratched its butt, and that sent the physicist off again, until she was practically clutching onto Holtzmann in an attempt to stay on her feet as she giggled.

“Oh God”, she brought out once she had calmed down enough again to speak, Holtzmann grinning at her as she still held her in her arms. Part of her noted that Erin was not pulling back, even though so far she had been rather shy about showing any sort of affection in public, Phil’s poison making her worry even more about what others might think of her than she had before all the damage he had done, “That was… oh wow.” Erin laughed, wiping away a few tears of laughter.

“That monkey had really good timing”, Holtzmann said with a smirk, earning her another giggle from the physicist. Erin let out an adorable little “whew” sound as she wiped at her eyes again, smiling a bit shyly and blushing when she noticed the way the engineer was looking at her, with a small smile curling her lips and a softness in her gaze she seemed to have reserved for her and only her. Erin had never seen her look at anyone else like that, and it made her feel incredibly special to know Holtzmann had a look of pure and utter adoration reserved just for her.

“Thank you”, she said, letting out the words which came to her mind before she could end up overthinking them, suddenly just needing to tell Holtzmann, “this… this is very nice. I’m glad we can do this together, I… I like being with you. Like that.”

She fell silent, feeling embarrassed all at once -  _ God, she had sounded like a stuttering teenager in High School, surely Holtz would laugh at this for her now, ask her if she was serious, if this was all she’d get after everything she’d done for Erin, how could she be so ungrateful… _

Her thoughts were about to spiral off into darkness when she noticed how Holtzmann was looking at her, with a smile so bright Erin almost expected the corners of her mouth to touch her ears any moment. She pulled her a bit closer and pressed a quick, but tender kiss to her cheek, mumbling “happy to hear that, cupcake” into the physicist’s ear afterwards. Erin gave her another shy smile as they pulled apart again, before taking hold of the engineer’s hand.

“Shall we continue?” she asked, earning a nod from the other woman. They continued their stroll through the zoo, and even though Holtzmann had reacted so positively to what Erin had said, the physicist found her mind wandering again, to unpleasant and dark areas, finding herself unable to stop it.

_ Telling her you like her might be enough for now _ , the small, treacherous voice whispered to her,  _ but you know this won’t last forever. She’ll want more from you at some point, even if she keeps telling you she doesn’t, and sooner or later, you’ll end up hurting her. Probably sooner than later, because you’re you, you don’t deserve any of this, and you’ll only bring her pain. _

As Erin pondered this, she the glance Holtzmann shot her. By now, the engineer had gotten quite skilled at reading Erin’s moods and was generally quick to figure out whenever she was thinking about something which dulled the happiness she obviously had felt minutes ago.

“Erin”, Holtzmann quietly said, stopping their walk and turning so she was facing the physicist, “what it is? Talk to me, please.”

It astounded Erin a bit, how quickly Holtzmann could tell that she was thinking such unpleasant thoughts. Feeling bad for ruining the good mood of their outing, she shrugged as her gaze dropped to the ground, Holtzmann making sure to not move too fast as she reached out to tenderly touch her cheek in an attempt to make her look at her again.

“I’m worried”, Erin mumbled. She wasn’t quite sure how to put her thoughts into words, but she figured she owed the engineer at least that much after everything Holtzmann had done for her and was still doing for her, “because… You’ve been so sweet to me, all this time, and… all I can do is take and take... and I hardly give anything back. I could barely tell you I like spending time with you now, even though I do… I really do… I don’t know why it’s so hard for me to say that…”

“Don’t worry about this, cupcake”, Holtzmann replied at once, not really surprising Erin. So far, this had been Holtzmann’s standard reaction whenever the redhead had voiced doubts about how she treated her, about how she might end up hurting her sooner or later. Yet every time, it still sounded as sincere as always, and no matter how unbelievable it sounded, Erin found herself trusting the engineer. “You give me more than you can imagine just by being with me like this. I’m perfectly happy with things as they are, alright?”

Erin looked doubtful, but nodded after a moment. It wasn’t the first time she’d had such doubts, and she knew it wouldn’t be the last time, but that didn’t make it any easier. Again, she wondered how Holtzmann could do this, how the engineer could put her own heart and well-being in jeopardy for someone like her. Before she could ponder that too long, though, Holtzmann lightly squeezed her hand again, beaming at the physicist.

“Come on”, the engineer said, with another bright smile, Erin smiling back a bit almost automatically, unable not to, “let’s go look at the penguins! They’re the cutest!”  
  
The engineer’s enthusiasm was somewhat contagious, and so, Erin nodded, her smile widening a bit. Holtzmann beamed at her once more, and they got moving again, making it possible for Erin to forget about her worries and fears for at least a little while longer. She knew she was far from okay, but at least for now, she was more than happy to let herself be distracted by the animals and Holtzmann’s laughter, simply enjoying her time with the engineer and how good and relaxed Holtzmann was making her feel.


	38. Chapter 38

“Alright”, Abby said as she parked the car in front of the Ross Center. It was a few days after Erin’s zoo date with Holtzmann, and Abby had accompanied Erin to this day’s appointment since Holtzmann had been right in the middle of working on the containment unit when it had been time for Erin to leave. The blonde hadn’t dared to leave it alone in the middle of her work on it, lest it explode, but Abby had been more than willing to join the physicist. “Here we are. I’ll be right in the waiting room as always, okay?”

Erin nodded, smiling bravely at the researcher. Abby smiled back at her and squeezed her hand before they both got out of Ecto-1 and made their way into the building, to Diana’s office. The older woman was already waiting for them and smiled encouragingly at Erin as she greeted her.

As always, Diana asked if she wanted something to drink once they had moved to her office and had sat down, offering tea, coffee or water; and as always, Erin politely declined, not wanting to be a burden, telling herself that giving her drinks certainly wasn’t part of the woman’s job.

“So”, Diana said once she had gotten comfortable, notepad and pen readied, “good to see you again, Erin. Can you tell me about what’s happened in your life since our last meeting?”

“Nothing special…” Erin shrugged lightly, still a little surprised how genuinely interested the woman always seemed in her life, despite it literally being part of her job description. “After my last time here, Holtzmann and I went to the zoo, and the day after that, we had a dinner date… um, at the firehouse. It was… Nice.” Erin replied, earning a warm smile from the therapist. “The zoo was a bit overwhelming… There were so many people, so…”

She trailed off, not to sure how to put it into words that she had felt like just hiding away in the firehouse again after the time at the zoo - enjoyable though it had been. Luckily, the others had seemed to understand, allowing Erin to do just that. She felt a little awful about her behaviour, what with her only leaving the place once to go on a smaller bust with the other three, but her friends had seemed to understand. Especially considering Erin had felt even more drained after the bust, barely able to tolerate the presence of Kevin, Abby, or Patty. Even Holtzmann, with her boundless energy, had almost been too much to handle, but Erin had been wise enough to know that being completely alone wouldn’t do her any good.

Holtz had picked up on that, however, simply giving Erin some space as she worked; being in the same room, she’d be close if Erin needed her, but still far enough away to give the physicist some time to calm down. Erin still wasn’t sure what she’d done to deserve someone like her, but in that moment she had just been grateful.

“I just felt… overwhelmed”, she tried to explain, gaze dropping at how inadequate this inability to put her feelings into words was making her feel. “Like… if I could have stopped the world and just had silence for a while, I would have done that. You know…? I never would send Abby and Patty and Kevin away for real but...”

“I know what you mean”, Diana nodded, to Erin’s slight relief, making her look at the therapist again, even though her stomach clenched up when the elder woman went on. “I noticed you didn’t mention Holtzmann right now. You don’t mind having her around?”

“...no”, Erin mumbled, not quite sure why Diana would ask her about this. The therapist knew about her dating Holtzmann (she had decided that she could actually call it dating at this point, what with them having had several actual dates by now), so really, it shouldn’t be surprising that Erin would want the engineer around, should it? Even when she felt so oddly overwhelmed, Holtzmann’s general presence was more calming than anything. It made sense for Erin to want her near, didn’t it?

“I like having her around.” She went on when Diana said nothing, the older woman just nodding encouragingly. “She makes me feel… safe. And good. I like being around her, but… I can’t tell her. It feels as if something’s  _ blocking _ me, in a way. And I’m so worried that, once I’m better, and can figure out what I want, I’m going to hurt her. She doesn’t deserve that, she’s been so good to me and I…”

Realizing that she was rambling, Erin forced herself to shut up. Diana took another thirty seconds to write on her notepad, then looked up at the redhead again. But while her eyes and voice kind when she replied, her words still served to make Erin’s blood run cold.

“It seems that you are quite… attached to Holtzmann”, the therapist said, lowering her notepad, clearly not feeling as if she had to take notes at the moment. “Did you consider that, perhaps, you feel as if something is holding you back because this attachment might have psychological reasons?”

“You think I’m using her to get better?” Erin brought out in a trembling voice, feeling as if Diana had actually punched her in the gut and finding it hard to breathe as one of her deepest fears was actually confirmed in front of her. She had been worried,  _ so _ worried, that using Holtzmann was exactly what she was doing. That she really only wanted her near because she wanted to get better, and that she would end up hurting the engineer in the end. She had tried to push those thoughts away best she could, but what with Diana now voicing similar thoughts…

_ God, I really am a horrible person. _

“No.” Diana shook her head, still sounding as kind as usual. “I sincerely doubt that’s what you’re doing, not after everything you told me about this relationship, and how you seemed to feel about Holtzmann even before all this started. However… And Erin, please remember I’m only trying to help, okay? ...Your attachment to Holtzmann, while helpful right now, might turn out to be harmful in the long run.”

Nothing Erin’s fearful expression, Diana shot the woman in front of her a sympathetic smile, before she continued speaking. “My honest belief is that your feelings for Holtzmann are genuine. However, you have been through a lot over these past months, and that doesn’t go away overnight. Do you remember what you told me during one of our first meetings? Why you began liking having Holtzmann around to begin with?”

Erin nodded slowly, recalling that specific conversation. “She made me feel… Safe.” she brought out, her voice still trembling. “She was nice to me… always… Even when-” She swallowed a few tears away, the guilt over potentially using Holtzmann still eating away at her. “Even when she knew what was happening… She never got mad. She just… She wanted to make me happy.”

“And she is, and that’s a good thing.” Diana nodded encouragingly. “But that doesn’t take away that what happened to you affects the way you see the world. We spoke about this before, and will undoubtedly talk about this again. It’s essentially why you’re here, isn’t it?”

Not sure where the other woman was going with this, Erin just nodded, trusting the older woman not to willingly want to make things hard for her.  _ She’s a medical professional, she knows what she’s doing _ .

“Perhaps you should gain some… distance from Holtzmann. Even just for short periods of time.” Noting the already panicked expression on Erin’s face, the older woman quickly shook her head. “I’m not saying you have to break up with her, or that you have to stop seeing her altogether. She is your friend, and she’s supportive, and clearly helpful in your recovery. However, you’ve mentioned spending nearly every second of every day with her, and while I understand that need for comfort, it’s not going to be helpful for your recovery in the long run.”

Erin supposed that made sense, even if she remained quiet so Diana could elaborate a little more.

“I suggest that you spend a night apart in between our next meetings. It gives you an opportunity to try and rely on your own mind, or even just on people other than Holtzmann. And perhaps the distance can help you to clarify what you feel for her, too. It might help you to gain some perspective on your emotions, to maybe help you figure out what could be holding you back.”

Erin didn’t like this idea, not one bit, but didn’t dare to talk back to the therapist. Because while she trusted Diana knew what she was talking about, that didn’t lessen the fear which immediately had taken hold of her the moment it had been suggested that she should sleep somewhere where Holtzmann wasn’t.

_ And she wouldn’t even know where to go,  _ she realized next. She had no apartment anymore. She had been living at the firehouse ever since things had ended with Phil - with Holtzmann - and while she knew that Holtzmann had an apartment, the thought of being alone all night in the firehouse terrified her. The place was large, public, and Phil had already been by there once before… The mere thought made her heart beat faster and her palms sweaty.

“Erin”, Diana said gently, reaching out and briefly touching her arm, bringing her back to the present. “I know this idea is frightening, but you know I wouldn’t suggest it if I didn’t think it might be helpful. I cannot stress enough how glad I am your friends seem to be supportive of you; having a good support network has been shown to help tremendously in someone’s recovery. However, at the end of the day, this is something you have to fight on your own, and I really think this will help with that. If it proves to be more harmful than anything else, we’ll stop, but do you think you can at least give it a try for me?”

“Yes.” Erin mumbled after a moment, telling herself that she had to do this if she wanted to get better, and that she was strong enough to do so.  _ After all, _ she reasoned internally,  _ Diana had been nothing but helpful so far, and certainly wouldn’t suggest anything if she didn’t really think it would be helpful. _

“Great”, Diana smiled, leaning back into her seat again. “I’m proud of you.” And with that, the topic of spending a night away from Holtzmann apparently was done, since she asked if Erin had been on any busts lately and how this had felt. And even though talking about this made Erin feel a bit better, the thought of spending a night away from the engineer loomed continuously in her mind, feeding her fears that Holtzmann would come to her senses and leave her and that this only would happen faster if they spent a night apart.

* * *

Abby could tell at once that something was bothering Erin when the physicist met her in the waiting room and they walked to the car. She knew better than to push, though, and instead of asking what was wrong she simply suggested that they should head back to the firehouse. Erin nodded at once, staring out the window the whole drive, fingers fidgeting nervously in her lap.

By the time they arrived at the firehouse, the researcher was dying to know what had Erin so nervous. The physicist looked as if she was close to throwing up, and that only got worse when she set foot into the firehouse and found both Holtzmann and Patty on the ground floor. They were talking in the kitchen, apparently waiting for coffee to get done, and Erin decided maybe it was best to rip off this bandaid as soon as possible. It would come out anyway; it wasn’t like Erin could hide this forever.

“Diana suggested something.” Erin blurted out the moment Holtzmann looked at her and opened her mouth to ask how it had been. The engineer immediately looking worried, taking note of how nervous Erin was, how pale and fidgety, but wasn’t sure whether or not to approach her girlfriend in this state. “She said we… we should spend one night a week apart because it might not be healthy how attached I am to you…”

“.. Okay”, Holtzmann mumbled, clearly not liking the idea. However, one look at Abby told her though that the researcher didn’t share her opinion, and to her growing dismay, Patty was nodding too. The engineer briefly feeling like yelling at them, an urge she bit back by telling herself that they only meant well.

“Erin, honey”, Abby said, while Patty placed what she hoped was a calming hand on Holtzmann’s arm, feeling at once how tense the blonde was, “I know you don’t like the thought, but… Diana could be right, you know? It might not be a bad idea. You can stay with me if you don’t want to be alone.”

Erin gave her friend a doubtful look, thinking that certainly, Abby would have better things to do in her free time than have her over as a houseguest. When she looked the researcher in the eyes though, all she saw was warmth and kindness, and it made her smile weakly despite her insecurities.

“I don’t like it”, Holtzmann grumbled, making the physicist look at her at once, with a hint of fearfulness, the look on her face prompting the engineer to backpedal hurriedly. “but Erin, I’m not mad at you about this, don’t even think that. Okay? I’m just… What if something happens, if you have another nightmare or something?”

“I’ll help”, Abby said before Erin could reply, skillfully ignoring the doubtful look Holtzmann had on her face now. “I do agree that it would be a bad idea to leave Erin here alone for the night, but if she comes home with me, it should be okay, right? And Diana might have a point, Holtz. You know she wouldn’t suggest this if she didn’t think it would help.”

“...I know”, Holtzmann had to admit with a sigh, “but that doesn’t mean I have to like it.”

Erin walked over to her as she spoke, and wordlessly moved to embrace her. Holtzmann hugged her back at once, and after exchanging one look, Abby and Patty left the room, giving them some privacy, a shudder running through Erin’s body when Holtzmann tenderly rubbed her back.

“I’ll be right here tomorrow morning,” Holtzmann said after just having held her in silence for a while, “waiting for you. With coffee and breakfast. Alright?”

Erin nodded bravely, even though deep inside, she was afraid, so scared that during the night, Holtzmann would realize how much better off she would be without Erin in her life. She was afraid that she’d come to the firehouse in the next day and Holtzmann would tell her that they had to break up, or that Holtzmann just  _ wouldn’t _ be there waiting for her after all. She wasn’t sure how to voice those fears, though. Not only did she not want to make the engineer angry, she feared that speaking these fears out loud would make them true, somehow.

As she buried her face in Holtzmann’s shoulder, the engineer could tell there was something else bothering Erin, but she too was wise enough to stay quiet, simply holding the physicist as she thought of the oncoming night she’d have to spend away from the woman in her arms, worries lingering in the back of her mind.


	39. Chapter 39

Erin looked as if she wanted to throw up when she left the firehouse with Abby in the evening, but didn’t try to bring up staying after all. She was well aware that the others would just say no, and besides, she’d made a promise to at least try. Expecting Patty to head home too, and ready for a night on her own in the firehouse, Holtzmann headed upstairs to her lab, figuring she might as well get some work done until she’d get tired enough to sleep.

Not that she thought she’d get much sleep with Erin gone. The engineer had gotten so used to having the physicist by her side during the night, she already knew the bed would feel empty and cold without her. The blonde had never really considered herself to be someone who’d miss the presence of one specific someone in her bed, but it seemed Erin Gilbert was the exception to every single one of her rules...

She’d been quite sure she’d hear Patty leave not too long after Erin and Abby had gone, so she was rather surprised when she heard Patty come up the stairs instead. “Holtzy”, the historian said as she reached the lab and walked over to where Holtzmann was standing at her workbench. The engineer shot her a brief glance before she focused on her project again, working with ostentation ( _ See how busy I am, no time for chit-chat _ ), “I brought you one of those nasty energy drink things you like so much.”

She put a can of Monster down on the table, earning her a brief “Thanks, Patty” from the blonde. Holtzmann still refused to look at her though, keeping her eyes on her project, missing the brief flash of hurt on Patty’s face. Things had started to get a bit better and less tense between the engineer and her, but it was more than obvious that Holtzmann hadn’t quite forgiven her yet, and the historian was determined to use Erin’s absence for the night to clear the air between them.

“Holtzy”, she thus said, and something in her tone gave the younger woman pause, “we should talk. If you want to yell at me, do it now, when Erin’s not around, because you know if she hears, she’ll think you’re mad at her again.”

“Yeah, and whose fault is that.” Holtzmann shot back, looking up from her work at last and glaring at Patty through her glasses. “And don’t say Phil now. Because it is, partly, but you know it’s not  _ just _ his fault.”

“I know”, Patty replied, somewhat surprising the blonde. She had expected the older woman to argue back, to tell her that it was ludicrous to blame her along with Phil for Erin’s state. She certainly hadn’t been expecting her to agree so freely.

“Abby and I... we both fucked up”, Patty went on, earning a brief nod from Holtzmann, “If I had listened to you, or if we both had paid more attention, Erin wouldn’t be in such a bad state right now. But Holtzy... you can’t be angry about this at us forever, for her sake and for the team’s. You know she wouldn’t want you to blame us for… what has happened.”

“Certainly not right now, she wouldn’t.” Holtzmann replied dryly, putting down her soldering iron and crossing her arms over her chest. “Right now, all she does it blame herself. For  _ everything _ ! Every single menial thing, every time any one of us might be  _ slightly _ inconvenienced, she blames herself and thinks  _ she _ did something wrong. And you’re right; if you had listened to me, things wouldn’t be so bad now. Erin wouldn’t be so bad now, if we had gotten her out sooner. She might not even be needing  _ therapy _ now, instead of crying in this woman’s office twice a week…”

She trailed off, fighting down her own emotions, not wanting to end up crying in front of Patty again. Patty reached out to briefly touch her shoulder, pulling back somewhat quickly at how Holtzmann stiffened in response, the historian’s voice soft when she replied after sorting her thoughts for a minute.

“I know,” she said again, “and I’m sorry. I know this doesn’t make anything better, but I really am sorry for messing up like that when you tried to talk to me and for… well, for what I said to her about the two of you.”

“That hurt.” Holtzmann said rather freely, in an uncharacteristically soft tone. “It really hurt, Patty. I’m just trying to help her, you know I am. I’d never do anything to… I don’t know, hurt her or make her worse. I  _ love _ her.”

Holtzmann’s voice finally broke on those last words, Patty properly reaching out and placing her hand on Holtzmann’s shoulder this time, relieved when the engineer didn’t pull away again. “That you might hurt her or make her worse wasn’t what I was concerned about, you know.” Patty pointed out in response, feeling bad for how she had acted back then all over again. But she was glad that at least Holtzmann and she were talking now, after the tension which had been between them ever since the incident during which she had caused the engineer to run off to the roof. “I was worried for you, Holtzy. We both know Erin’s in no state to purposefully use or hurt you, but…”

“She still might end up doing that, yeah...” Holtzmann replied, shrugging. “I don’t care. It’s a risk I’m willing to take if it helps her get better. He did so much damage Patty… What if it can’t be fixed? What if not even therapy will help and we never get her back the way she was before he…”

“She’s gonna get better.” Patty confidently replied, but despite the firm tone of her voice, Holtzmann still found herself wondering if the historian really meant it or was just saying what she thought the blonde wanted to hear. “It’ll just a take a while. He’s had so much time to poison her mind, we can’t expect her to be perfectly fine after just a few talks with the therapist…”

“She still flinches, you know”, Holtzmann mumbled, gaze dropping down to her feet now, “when I move too fast towards her. I try not to do it, I know it makes her jump and frightens her, but sometimes it just happens anyway, and then she flinches. She still thinks I’m gonna hurt her…”

“That’s gonna get better, too”, Patty reassured her, “we just have to give her time. I know it seems like she can’t be… ‘fixed’ at times, for lack of a better word, but it’s gonna be fine, I know it will be.”

“I hope you’re right”, Holtzmann said with a sigh, accepting the metaphorical olive branch Patty had brought by grabbing the energy drink and opening it, taking a few big gulps. Patty found herself smiling at the sight, knowing it had much more meaning than the engineer simply being thirsty.

“Believe me,” she said, giving the engineer’s shoulder another brief squeeze, “it’s gonna be fine. With her therapist and you taking care of her like that, there’s no way she can’t get better. You’re good for her, Holtzy.”

Holtzmann smiled at that, clearly touched, and Patty beamed back at her. and just like that, the tension between them was gone, the engineer moving in to hug the older woman, letting out an “ooff” when Patty returned the hug with a bit too much enthusiasm.

“Careful there.” the blonde brought out, a bit breathless, “now I know how Dr Gorin felt when I hugged her so tight.”

“Sorry”, Patty replied with a small laugh, loosening her hold on the smaller woman a bit. Holtzmann smiled back at her, happier than she had thought she would end up when Patty had come to her lab, even though her smile faded a bit again at what the historian said next, reminding her unintentionally of the lonely night waiting for her.

“You want me to spend the night?” the historian wanted to know, “So you won’t have to be here all alone?”

“Nah, it’s okay,” Holtzmann let her know, elaborating when she received a sceptical look, “I probably won’t be able to sleep much, so I’ll work through most of the night. You’d only end up getting bored but tired because I’ll be loud.”

On any other day, Patty would have accepted that, with the thought that she truly wouldn’t get much sleep with Holtzmann working. She could see the dismay in the blonde’s eyes though, and knew at once that despite her bravado and denial, Holtzmann wasn’t all too fond of the thought of being here alone all night.

“No worries,” she thus said, “I can keep busy, and I have a deep sleep. I don’t wanna leave you alone here tonight, okay?”

“...okay”, Holtzmann agreed, quicker than Patty had expected, already having been prepared to argue about this with the engineer, “...thanks, Patty.”

Patty just smiled and briefly touched her shoulder again, then let her know she’d go back downstairs and give her some time to work. Holtzmann smiled back at her and nodded, feeling a bit better while Patty went back downstairs, even though she knew that this wouldn’t last long, that the longing and feelings of loneliness would come back the moment she’d go to her cold, empty bed.

* * *

While Holtzmann and Patty had their first proper talk in weeks, Erin and Abby were at the researcher’s apartment, things not faring much better there. Abby had offered to order pizza for them for dinner, and Erin had agreed even if she stopped after only eating a single slice. Abby could very easily tell how nervous Erin was from how stiffly she sat on the couch and how her hands fidgeted in her lap.

“Erin”, Abby said in the kindest voice she could manage, putting her own plate aside for now, “it’s going to be fine. You know it is.”

She had a moment to regret not having asked Holtzmann how she usually helped Erin handle panic attacks, belatedly realizing the possibility that her friend might suffer through one during that first night away from the engineer. For the moment, it didn’t seem as if this might happen, but Abby had witnessed it a few times, and knew how fast the panic could strike.

“What if it won’t be...” Erin replied quietly, giving Abby a look so frightened that it both made her heart clench up and her blood boil with anger - anger she was careful to hide from her features though. Yet again, Abby wondered how they could have let this happen, how they could have allowed it that Phil had reduced the radiant, enthusiastic woman her best friend had been to this nervous, constantly frightened wreck. “What if she’ll realize what a burden I am to her… What if she leaves me...”

“Erin, honey, no”, Abby gave back, putting one arm around her and rubbing her back soothingly, heart aching again at how unbelievably tense Erin was, “Holtz won’t leave you. I bet she misses you as much as you miss her right now. She loves you.”

Erin swallowed heavily in response, not looking one bit like she believed Abby. “Phil loved me… And he…” She couldn’t even bring herself to speak those words out loud, simply swallowing the words back before she looked down at her feet. Her hands were clenched into fists, Erin willing herself not to cry even if she could feel the tears burning in her eyes.

“Erin, Phil didn’t love you… Not really.” Abby gave her best to sound kind and reassuring and not judgemental or angry the slightest, because she knew Erin would immediately see this as as directed at her, even if it wasn’t. And yet again, the researcher thought about what she would do, should Phil magically appear out of thin air in front of her - she’d cheerfully strangle him with his stupid v-neck, and then bust his ghost so he would be gone once and for all.

She had meant well with those words, had wanted to point out the difference between Holtzmann and Phil, but clearly, they had been the wrong thing to say, since Erin paled even further - briefly giving Abby cause to fear her friend might actually faint - and small pearls of sweat appeared on her brow, her breath quickening.

“What I mean is…”, Abby hurriedly tried to make it better, hoping to a higher power she didn’t really believe in that she wouldn’t make it even worse now,  “people who love each other don’t hurt each other. He hurt you. A lot. Holtz doesn’t do that. Holtz loves you, she’s not going to leave.”

“You say that now…”, Erin brought out in a thin, breathless and slightly trembly voice, “but what if you’re wrong? What if  _ she’s  _ wrong, wrong about what she sees in me? She just thinks that... She just thinks I won’t hurt her. She thinks I’m this…  _ person _ …”

Erin stopped there, burying her face in Abby’s shoulder as her best friend pulled her closer, allowing Erin to cry a little. “What if she comes to her senses? What if she realized how terrible I am for her… I can’t lose her, Abby-”

Hearing the desolate tone of the physicist and feeling her tremble against her made Abby’s heart clench up; she had to take in a few deep breaths of her own before she could reply, once more deeply hurt by what this horrible man had done to her friend, how he had  _ changed _ her. “Erin…”, she finally trusted herself enough to speak, “you’re not going to lose Holtz. She adores you, has ever since you walked into Higgins that day. I thought it was just Holtz being Holtz at first, but what she feels for you… It’s serious. I know it is.”

Erin shook her head. “That was then… Before she knew I could be this terrible…”

“You’re not terrible, Erin.”, Abby reassured her, rubbing her back soothingly, once again hoping that she was doing and saying the right things, now regretting that she hadn’t asked Holtzmann for more advice on how to handle such moments.

Erin shook her head. “I am. I got myself into this, and I can’t stop crying even now, and I just want her near me because she makes me feel… happy? She makes me happy, Abby, and she’s so good to me… I really don’t deserve her, and what if being away from me makes her realize that? She’ll realize I’m terrible for her and she won’t love me anymore and she probably won’t even be my  _ friend _ anymore and…”

Realizing she was rambling, her words getting lost in a haze of tears, Erin just buried her face in Abby’s shoulder again, the researcher calmly continuing to rub her best friend’s back.

“There there… It’s going to be okay, Erin. I promise…” Erin just let out another sniffle in reply, and with her heart clenching up again, the researcher kept rubbing her back and reassuring her that it would be okay, now not so sure anymore that this had been a good idea after all.

* * *

Holtzmann hadn’t slept much during the night, and when Erin and Abby arrived at the firehouse in the next morning, she could tell at first glance that Erin hadn’t either. The physicist was pale, the dark rings beneath her eyes forming a stark contrast to her skin, and Holtzmann felt even worse than she had during the long, lonely night when she noticed how nervously Erin was looking at her.

_ As if she expects me to tell her something bad now,  _ the engineer thought to herself, by now well aware of how Erin’s mind worked thanks to Phil. She didn’t doubt for one second that Erin had spent the night worrying that Holtzmann would end up leaving her; that one night apart would be enough to push the blonde from her side. She even looked a little surprised Holtzmann was here to begin with, which made the blonde’s heart clench up a little.

“Good morning, cupcake”, she said, even managing a tired smile a she walked over to Erin and kissed her gently. She could feel the second of surprise the physicist experienced before she kissed her back, looking a bit less worried by the time they pulled apart again.

“I missed you.” Holtzmann mumbled to her as she wrapped her up in an embrace, Erin barely able to believe her luck. Here Holtzmann was, after enough time to realize that this whole thing was a bad idea, and still was as kind and gentle with her as she had been during all the previous weeks, not appearing as if the night apart had changed what she thought of her at all.

“I missed you too...” she told the engineer, with a slight tremble in her voice, “I… didn’t get much sleep.”

“Me neither”, Holtzmann let her know at once, some of tiredness vanishing from her face as her eyes lit up when she continued. “Hey, you wanna go upstairs and cuddle a bit? We deserve that and it’s not cheating because the night is over.”

Part of Erin wanted to decline, argue that certainly, Holtzmann had better things to do. Another, bigger part was so tired though, and just wanted to be close to the blonde, and enjoy the fact that Holtzmann wouldn’t leave her. So she nodded, managing a slight smile of her own at the bright grin the engineer gave her in response to her agreement.

“See you later guys.” Holtzmann waved to Abby and Patty, then grasped Erin’s hand and led the way. They only took off their shoes before they fell down onto the bed, Holtzmann immediately pulling Erin into her arms, a content sigh coming from the physicist as she rested her head on the other woman’s shoulder.

“This is nice...” Erin mumbled once she had gotten comfortable and Holtzmann had begun rubbing her back in slow, soothing circles. She still heard that Holtzmann let out a vaguely agreeing noise before she drifted off into sleep faster than she had in weeks, both women soon slumbering soundly, never moving away from each other even in the deepest sleep.


	40. Chapter 40

Perhaps, Erin thought to herself as she made her way into Diana’s office for yet another appointment, three weeks after Holtzmann and she had spent a night apart for the first time, cuddling with the engineer in the morning after wasn’t cheating, like Holtzmann had said; still she felt a bit wary when Diana asked her how the nights apart had been the previous weeks, for a moment not sure if she should mention the mornings the blonde and she had shared after these nights.

“It went better this week than the previous two”, she decided not to keep anything from her therapist, figuring that this might not be beneficial for her treatment, “but we… kind of… cuddled the morning after? I’m sorry, I just missed her so much and she missed me too…”

“There’s no need to apologize”, Diana told her, smiling reassuringly, Erin feeling a bit better and less as if she had done something wrong - quite unaware that this was an effect of her continued sessions with the elder woman, “please do keep in mind, Erin, that I suggested this also so you could gain some perspective on your feelings for Holtzmann. You missed her, you say?”

“I did”, Erin admitted, feeling even more relieved and less as if she had done something wrong when Diana gave her another smile, “and I’m still worried she might end up leaving me during one of those nights, but she keeps telling me she won’t…”

Diana hadn’t met Holtzmann so far, and thus was unable to make any truly objective statements regarding their relationship. From what Erin had told her, however, it sounded as if the engineer was nothing but supportive, quite unlike the details Erin had revealed about Phil during their talks.

“From what you told me”, the therapist thus said, choosing her words carefully, “I do believe she is honest and genuine when she says she won’t leave you. Are you afraid she will leave you because you have feelings for her, or because of other reasons?”

“...I don’t know”, Erin mumbled, fingers beginning to fidget nervously, “I mean… I’m not alone when I’m not with her that one night a week, Abby lets me stay with her then but… if she left me… I’d miss her. I’d miss how she makes me feel.”

_ Safe, protected, loved, like someone worthy to be loved. _

She couldn’t quite put these feelings into words, and so, she fell silent. Diana smiled in response and nodded, apparently still getting what Erin was and wasn’t talking about, taking a sip of water before she continued.

“Let’s talk about the busts you’ve been on with the team,” she said, “how did those go?”

“Okay, I guess”, Erin replied, smiling a bit at the memory. Busting made her feel almost as good as being with Holtzmann did, the time she spent chasing down ghosts the only hours of the day she did not feel inadequate and pathetic, especially when Holtz cheered for her and told her how badass she was when she blasted yet another ghost to oblivion.

“We work well as a team still”, she added, Diana giving her a slight smile, “even though I was a bit out of practice the first few times, but it’s all coming back. Holtzmann says I still have the best aim from the four of us, but I think hers is better…”

“How does it make you feel to go on busts?” Diana asked, a question Erin had been more or less expecting. There always was a lot of talk about feelings in this room, good and bad ones, and she smiled a bit as she replied, much preferring to speak of how she felt when she had a ghost ensnared in the proton stream than about how Phil had made her feel during their relationship.

“Good”, she simply said, “busting… makes me feel good. Especially when it goes really well, Holtzmann improved the proton shotgun she made for me and it’s quite powerful now. One blast is usually enough to take anything up to a Class IV apart, and even the Class V we encountered last time was significantly weakened after it took a hit with it…”

She realized that she was rambling and forced herself to shut up, blushing a bit, telling herself that certainly, Diana had gotten bored at this point and had better things to do than listen to her talk about the ghostbusting business. To her surprise though, the therapist smiled at her, not appearing bored the slightest when she spoke up.

“I can tell that you enjoy going on busts with the team again”, she let the physicist know, making her smile and nod, “are you not scared during them though? You do fight malevolent ghosts.”

“No”, Erin gave back, not even having to think about it, “I… it’s hard to explain, but all I feel is… excited. And good, when the ghost has been captured or neutralized. I know they can hurt me, or my friends, but… You know, the weapons Holtzmann builds for us, they are so good, I know they will never malfunction, and I feel safe when I have them.”

Erin wasn’t sure if she was making sense, but Diana was nodding along, and still smiling, so she figured that at least, she didn’t sound like a complete idiot.

“Can you tell me about what Phil would say when you went on busts?” the therapist went on, and some of Erin’s joy she had felt when speaking of busts puffed away as she thought back to the man’s words about her work, but she knew that speaking of it was necessary for her treatment, even if it hurt, and so she did, encouraged by the warm looks and smiles Diana kept giving her, making her feel safe despite the unpleasant things she was speaking of.

* * *

It was the first time since Erin had started going on busts again that the team had to split up, and Erin wasn’t quite sure how she felt about this. At least she had been paired up with Holtzmann. She doubted the engineer would have let it happen that Erin went with anyone but her, but she still felt oddly nervous, a million unpleasant scenarios running through her mind as she walked down the hallway next to Holtzmann.

_ What if Phil had been right? What if she wasn’t cut out for this kind of work, too slow, too timid, too weak? What if she failed and Holtzmann got hurt? _

She’d never forgive herself if something happened to Holtzmann because of her, and she feared that Abby and Patty might not forgive her, either. They might even kick her out again, and Holtzmann wouldn’t stop them this time because she’d be mad about having gotten hurt…

“Erin..” Holtzmann’s voice distracted her from these thoughts, the engineer gently touching her shoulder, demonstrating how good she was at reading her moods by now with what she said next, “What is it? Are you okay?”

“...yes”, Erin made herself say, telling herself that they had other things to worry about in this very moment than her insecurities and anxiety - namely a Class IV which would gleefully rip their heads off, if it was given the chance. “I’m just… a bit out of practice, I think.”

“You’re doing fine, cupcake.” Holtzmann reassured her at once, smiling at her. Somehow, Erin managed to smile back, even though her smile was a bit shaky. She gripped the proton gun tighter when seconds later, the fine hair in the back of her neck started to rise and her ears popped, the way Holtzmann grimaced showing that she had felt it too.

“Where is it...” the engineer then mumbled, glancing around as if looking hard enough would bring the ghost out. Erin felt herself smiling a bit again when Holtzmann raised her voice next. “ _ Come out, come out, wherever you are! _ ”

The ghost either didn’t like Holtzmann’s sing-song voice or had been on the way already, they would never know. It startled them both as it shot out of the wall right next to them, and this time, Holtzmann had no chance to react fast enough to shield Erin.

The ghost started spewing slime at once, and of course, it was aiming straight for Erin. She just about had enough time to bring her hands up, in an attempt to shield her face, then the goo rained down on her, unpleasantly sticky, sliding into her coveralls and underwear, until she once again felt it in literally every crack.

“Hey Buster!” She heard Holtzmann say, her voice muffled by the slime clogging up the physicist’s ears. She heard the proton gun go off as well, but apparently, Holtzmann either had missed or the ghost had gotten out of the way, and she heard the apparition’s cackling fade as it flew off.

_ Oh God, you got slimed again. And with Holtzmann right there! You’re covered in the stuff, this is disgusting, you know how disgusting this is, how bad it smells, Holtzmann is going to hate this, like Phil did, he was right when he said it’s disgusting, you’re disgusting, she’s going to… _

“Erin”, Holtzmann said, alarmed, having picked up on how the physicist’s breath was quickening at once, and remembering well how Erin had reacted the last time she’d gotten slimed like that, “Erin? Cupcake? Look at me, please.”

She knew that touching Erin without warning when the redhead was having a panic attack wasn’t a good idea, and fought the urge to put her hand on her arm or shoulder, especially when Erin just shook her head, eyes squeezed shut. Holtzmann did make sure to stand right in front of Erin though, so she’d be in the physicist’s line of sight, making sure to keep the brief anger which flared up at Phil at how panicked and desolate Erin looked from showing through her features, all too aware that Erin surely would think yet again that Holtzmann was mad at her.

“Erin, it’s okay.” she said, not sure what else to say, but knowing it wasn’t the right thing, judging from how Erin kept gasping for breath, eyes still shut tight. “Really, it is. It’s just slime, okay? Try to breathe like me or you’ll pass out, please?”

Holtzmann gave her best to breathe slow and evenly, and was somewhat relieved when, after another thirty seconds of short, hectic gasps, Erin managed to slow her own breaths down at least a bit. She still looked frightened though, her eyes darting left and right as if she expected a sort of attack any moment, the trembles which ran through her still all too slim body making Holtzmann’s heart ache.

“Cupcake?” she said, keeping her voice low and hopefully calming, “Is it okay if I touch you?”

“Disgusting...” Erin brought out in reply, in a thin, breathless voice, confirming Holtzmann’s fears what exactly had caused this panic attack, her heart breaking for the redhead all over again, “this… I’m…”

“Sweetheart, no”, Holtzmann said at once, making sure not to move too fast as she dared to reach out, briefly touching the other woman’s arm and let her hand rest there when Erin didn’t react negatively, “it’s okay, really. C’mere…”

Still mindful of not moving too fast, she took a careful step closer to Erin, then put one arm around her shoulders. When the physicist didn’t try to step away from her, or reacted badly any other way, Holtzmann then moved to hug her, feeling her tense up for a second as she embraced her and held her close, a heavy breath coming from the redhead afterwards as she slumped into the other woman’s arms.

“It’s alright.” Holtzmann said again, mentally kicking herself for finding herself unable to come up with something better, rubbing Erin’s back and ignoring the squelching noises this produced, “It really is, okay? Don’t worry, everything’s perfectly alright.”

She wasn’t a big fan of the taste of ectoplasm, having gotten into her mouth more than once during her Ghostbuster career. Still, she knew that there was only one way to convince Erin that she didn’t think of her as disgusting after she’d gotten slimed. And so, Holtzmann bit the bullet for her and kissed her gently, making sure to not apply too much pressure, ready to pull back the moment Erin would show the slightest sign of being uncomfortable with this.

“Holtzmann”, Erin mumbled once the engineer had pulled back again, her breathing slowing down further as she appeared a bit dazed now, “why would you… I’m covered in that stuff and you kiss me?”

“Yup!” the engineer replied at once, clearly unimpressed by said slime, even though it now clung to her own coveralls and parts of her face, as well, “Couldn’t care less. I love smooching you, I love you, no matter if there’s slime or not.”

She made a point of kissing Erin on the cheek when the physicist looked doubtful, and when she pulled back, strings of slime hung in the air between Erin and herself for a moment before they fell to the floor with soft splattering sounds. And all at once, Erin found herself giggling, shaking her head as Holtzmann beamed at her.

“You’re crazy.” the physicist then mumbled, at the same time realizing that the engineer’s behaviour had done the trick and had stopped the panic attack before it had had a chance to grow to full force, “...thank you.”

“Nothing to thank me for, cupcake”, Holtzmann beamed at her, earning another small smile. The engineer asked if they should continue on their way, making Erin nod, the physicist smiling to herself as she got moving with the other woman again, feeling much better despite the slime which still clung to her.


	41. Chapter 41

The moment they were back at the firehouse, Erin made her way to the bathroom, though she felt much less bothered by the slime at this point. Holtzmann had smooched her several more times during the rest of the bust and during the way home, and while Abby and Patty had teased her a bit because she had gotten slimed  _ again _ , it had been good-natured teasing rather than the mean barbs Phil often had fired off at her.

As she stood in the shower, she thought back to the ease with which Holtzmann had hugged and kissed her, and found herself smiling at the memory. The slime was still gross, and she knew that it tasted just dreadful, but the engineer hadn’t let that stop her, ignoring the yuckiness of the moment just so she could make her feel better.

_ I’m really not sure what I did to deserve her,  _ Erin thought to herself as she washed her hair. She was glad that by now, they had figured out which shampoo and which soap worked best against slime. The green goo swirled down the drain, and Erin let her mind wander, thinking back to how Holtzmann had kissed her, the way she’d looked at her afterwards.

The warm tingle she felt low in her belly at the thought of Holtzmann’s lips on hers surprised her somewhat, and her cheeks heated up. So far, the engineer and she hadn’t done more than cuddle and make out, and clearly, Holtzmann was more than willing to give her as much time as she needed for anything more than that.

And up until this moment, Erin hadn’t truly thought of sleeping with the blonde, the idea making her nervous and anxious. Now though, this wasn’t all she felt, if the tingle between her legs was anything to go by, and she found herself wondering what this might mean.

_ Perhaps you’re getting ready,  _ she realized, feeling simultaneously excited and anxious at the thought. It was an odd mixture. She had to admit there was more excitement than anxiety though, and Erin figured that this was a good sign, even smiling a bit to herself as she finished cleaning up.

As she stepped out of the shower and wrapped up in a towel, she thought back to the time Holtzmann had seen her like this, to how the engineer had stared at her, as if she was the most desirable woman in the world. She was quite sure that this had been somewhat exaggerated, perhaps a bit of an act to make her feel better, but still Holtzmann had been nothing but kind and patient with her ever since they had started dating. Because of that, Erin told herself that, even if she did sleep with the blonde, it certainly wouldn’t make her act any differently towards her.

_ If sex was all she wanted, she could get that much easier somewhere else, _ Erin told herself as she towelled her hair dry, making sure no slime was left on any of the auburn strands, feeling much better by the time she had pulled on her bathrobe and left the bathroom.

She made her way to the bedroom she still shared with Holtzman, as strange as it was to do so with how short they actually had been together, and pulled on fresh clothes from the stuff they had bought during their thousand-dollar-shopping-spree. After, she went to the lab to see what the engineer was doing, feeling calm and even a bit happy as the blonde glanced up from her work and their eyes met. Erin smiled back shyly at the bright smile Holtzmann gave her, knowing she still had a long way to go, but allowing herself to think that perhaps, some day, things would be as they had been before Phil and before the changes she had gone through.

* * *

“Hey cupcake”, Holtzmann said a few days later, as the four of them were getting ready for another bust, “I got you a little something.”

“Oh?” Erin gave back, not quite sure if that was the best time for gifts, even though she found herself curious and a bit excited. Beaming brightly at her, the engineer nodded, then reached into her locker, Erin letting out a little gasp when the blonde pulled a pair of teal boots from its depths.

“I know they’re not exactly like the ones you had.”!Holtzmann said, a bit bashfully, “but they’re closest to the ones you had I could find, so…”

“They’re perfect”, Erin brought out, touched as she accepted them. She remembered the fate of the boots she had had before; she’d had them on when she’d gone to Phil slimed for the first time, and he had asked her if she was serious, if she really thought this sort of footwear was fitting for a grown-up scientist like her.

She had felt bad enough back then, for how she had freaked him out with the slime, and so had thrown the boots out, even though she had felt bad about losing them. The standard issue black ones had done their job well enough, she supposed, but still it felt oddly right and good to have more colourful ones again.

“Thank you.” Erin added, throwing her arms around Holtzmann in an enthusiastic hug and, for once not caring that Abby and Patty were there, giving her quite the resounding smooch. The engineer was grinning even wider by the time Erin pulled back, and the other two were smiling, as well, happy to see Erin so overjoyed.

It was the first time that she was around Abby and Patty and didn’t look constantly nervous, as if she feared they might start to yell at her any moment. The fact that they were going out on a bust, so she’d have a chance to wear her new boots right away, only served to make her feel better, and she caught herself smiling happily again and again as Holtzmann drove to the site.

Unbeknownst to her, Holtzmann had spoken to Jennifer Lynch shortly before the bust, and had told her how going on busts was making Erin feel so much better and accomplished. The PA had told her that she’d make sure Erin would feel even better after this certain bust, having refused to tell the engineer would she would do though, even when Holtzmann had practically pleaded her to reveal it.

“It’s nothing which will be bad for Dr Gilbert.” was the only thing she’d said, “Just trust me on this, alright?”

A year ago, Holtzmann would have laughed at those words, her trust in the woman having been pretty much non-existent. After everything she had done for Erin though, the engineer just had let out a vaguely agreeing noise, and gave her best to hide the bit of knowledge she had now as they arrived at the building where the bust would happen. The last thing they needed, after all, was that Erin would get distracted by whatever Jennifer was planning. If Erin was distracted, she could end up getting hurt, and Holtzmann did not want to imagine how bad this would be for the progress the physicist had made the past few weeks.

As it turned out, there had been no reason for her to worry. Erin was highly focused, and even though they were fighting a clearly malevolent ghost which enjoyed throwing anything it could get its hands on at them, she was obviously enjoying herself, even giggling a bit when for once, it wasn’t her who got slimed, but Holtzmann. The engineer looked oddly like a raccoon when she took off her glasses and a circle-shaped area around her eyes ended up slime-free.

This time, it was Erin who ignored the slime and the taste as she kissed her once the ghost had been trapped. It had been a fairly easy bust, just one class IV, but still she felt good and happy when they left the building, even though some of that happiness faded when she saw the small group of reporters waiting outside. The cameras began to click at once, and the scrutiny made her feel more than a bit nervous.

She almost expected them to start asking unfriendly questions, questions which would sound doubtful about the legitimacy of what they were doing or would downright state that nobody believed them, again, that the belief of the public in the Ghostbusters had faded away as time had gone by. Instead, one of the reporters spoke up, demanding to know if they had been successful, Patty being the one to answer, a bright smile on her face as she did so.

“The ghost is all locked up.” She said, pointing to the trap Holtzmann had strapped to her pack, “One less ghost New York has to worry about.”

“Dr Holtzmann,”, another reporter addressed the engineer directly, Erin feeling a bit overwhelmed when she saw nothing but friendly faces. Not one of the reporters appeared as if they didn’t believe them, or if they were planning to paint them as frauds. “will you still not reveal how your equipment works?”

“Nope”, Holtzmann smirked, earning a brief smile from the physicist, the engineer clearly not caring the slightest that she was still pretty much covered in slime when the reporters took several pictures of her, Erin quite unaware that she was standing close enough to Holtzmann to end up on them as well.

There were a few more questions, Erin leaving it to the others to answer them, not quite feeling confident enough to do so. She did feel quite good though, unable to stop smiling as the other three spoke to the press, feeling better than she had in weeks by the time the reporters had been satisfied and were leaving one by one.

She felt just like she had when they had captured their first ghost, back at the Stonebrook theatre, or when she had first seen the ghost of Gertrude Aldridge. Her smile widened as she thought back to those moments, to how they had celebrated afterwards. She’d danced then, she remembered, for once not having cared that others were there to see her. Erin knew that dancing wasn’t one of her better skills, and usually avoided it whenever other people were around, but all at once, her emotions overwhelmed her at the memories and the good feelings about the current bust.

Before she could think about it too much and stop herself, Erin gave in to the feelings and hopped off the stairs, landing on the sidewalk with a resounding  _ thump _ . And even though there was no music, she started to groove, neither noticing the surprised and delighted look on the faces of Abby and Patty, nor how Holtzmann started to beam as she danced.

Her dancing was as adorkable as it had ever been, and on any other day, Erin would have been all too aware of this. In this very moment though, she didn’t care, not even when pedestrians walking by glanced at her curiously, a little giggle coming from her as she made finger guns at them.

The look on Holtzmann’s face at the sight could only be described as “heart-eyed”, her grin so wide that the corners of her mouth were close to touching her ears. Even when Erin realized what she was doing, and slowly stopped, looking a bit embarrassed, Holtzmann kept grinning, practically bouncing up to her and making her giggle again when she threw both arms around her.

“You are the most adorable woman I’ve ever laid eyes on.” The engineer declared, giving her a resounding smooch on her reddening cheek, “so cute, this is killing me. The Holtzmann is going to die and go to Heaven, right now.”

“Please don’t”, Erin replied with a small laugh, her embarrassment fading as she saw nothing but happiness and support on the other Ghostbusters’ faces, “the Erin would be sad then.”

For a few seconds, Holtzmann just stared at her, while Abby snickered behind her. Then, the engineer burst out laughing as well, and pulled Erin into an embrace again, and as the physicist hugged her back, she giggled, as well, all her doubts and troubles and insecurities at least for the moment forgotten.


	42. Chapter 42

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Smutty times up ahead, my friends ;)

The presence of reporters at the bust led to several articles in various newspapers over the next few days, all of them in favour of the Ghostbusters. Holtzmann made sure to collect them all, presenting them to Erin proudly on Friday afternoon, beaming at her girlfriend as she handed the little stack to her.

“We should start collecting these somewhere!”, she suggested, figuring it couldn’t hurt to have a sort of scrapbook of praise for the Ghostbusters Erin could look at when she was feeling down. “Listen to this,  _ The Ghostbusters present themselves as an effective and efficient team, coordinating their efforts to trap the offending apparition as fast and with as little danger for the public as possible. _ ”

“And none of them doubt that what we do is real?” Erin wanted to know, a bit surprised. She knew all too well that there were still people out there who thought that they were just a bunch of frauds, but unbeknownst to her, Jennifer Lynch had made sure to only contact people from newspapers she knew thought well of the Ghostbusters, and who didn’t doubt them anymore, especially after the Times Square incident.

“Not one of them”, Holtzmann reassured her, unlike Erin perfectly aware of the strings Jennifer had pulled, but deciding to keep that tidbit to herself. “They know that what we do is legit. Hey, we should celebrate this, how about we go out to dinner tonight? It’s been waaayyy too long since I last saw you in that amazing dress you got.”

Erin blushed a bit at that, much to Holtzmann’s delight, and nodded her agreement without thinking. They had been on a few dates which had happened outside the firehouse, but it had been a while since their last one, and even though she still was a bit nervous about going out in public with Holtzmann as her official girlfriend - always worrying what others might think of her - she realized that she missed going out with the engineer.

“Excellent!”, the blonde beamed, earning another small smile from Erin, “Any wishes about the food? Or a place you wanna go to?”

Her first impulse was to say that Holtzmann should choose, not wanting to make the wrong choice and upset the engineer. But by now though, the therapy sessions were having at least a bit of an effect, and so Erin took a moment to seriously ponder the question instead of saying that she would be fine with whatever Holtzmann would choose right away; something she had done whenever Phil had suggested going out for dinner or lunch.

“Um”, she started, fidgeting nervously, something Holtzmann noticed at once, but didn’t comment on, “there’s… this one Greek place I really like? If you don’t like that it’s okay, too…”

“Greek’s perfectly fine, cupcake”, Holtzmann reassured her at once. She probably would have eaten nails and bits of wood, had Erin suggested a place which served only that, but the engineer was more than pleased with Greek food. “I’ll make reservations then?”

Erin nodded before she could ponder it too much, and talk herself into the idea that Holtzmann only had agreed to be nice. The engineer beamed at her, stealing a brief, but tender kiss from her before she practically bounced away to make the reservations, happily singing “I’m going out with Eeeeerin” to herself, glancing over her shoulder to give the physicist another bright grin when Erin just had to let out a giggle as reaction.

She wondered briefly why Holtzmann would still be so excited about going out with her. It wasn’t their first date, after all, and she was quite certain it wouldn’t be their last, either. She still thought she was nothing special, not worth all this excitement, but then again, she figured she might as well enjoy it while it lasted, smiling to herself as she found herself looking forward to the date and the time she’d spend with the blonde engineer.

* * *

Even though part of her still worried about gaining weight and ending up unattractive and even unlovable to the engineer, the therapy had some results about Erin’s troubles with food as well. After a gentle reminder from Holtzmann that she should eat what she  _ wanted _ and not what she thought she should have, Erin had chosen Gyros, one of her favourite dishes, and had given her best to ignore the fact that it wasn’t exactly diet food.

She even had gone as far as sharing a dessert with Holtzmann, and felt pleasantly full now as they strolled back to the firehouse, hand in hand. So far, Erin had been somewhat wary about public displays of affection like that, but the dinner had been so good and the evening so nice in general that at least for the moment, she didn’t care what anyone might think as they held hands.

Every now and then, Holtzmann would run her thumb over the back of her hand or her knuckles almost absent-mindedly, and Erin wondered if the engineer was aware of the jolt she sent all the way up her arm to her shoulder with the little gesture. It made Erin think back to the moment in the shower, when thinking of Holtzmann’s lips on hers had made her feel decidedly tingly all over.

_ Call it as it is,  _ she thought to herself, blushing a bit at her own thoughts, glad that Holtzman wasn’t looking at her in this very moment,  _ you were aroused. _

Again she wondered what this meant, if it was a sign that she was getting ready to do more than kissing and making out with the engineer. She noted that for the first time ever since this relationship had started, the thought of doing more didn’t make her feel anxious, but excited and a bit tingly, making her wonder if this meant that she finally was ready.

_ Only one way to find out _ , she thought to herself as they kept walking, swallowing, feeling simultaneously anxious and excited. Holtzmann glanced at her, clearly picking up how her mood was changing, but not asking about it - at least for the moment - and only squeezing her hand reassuringly.

Erin made herself smile at her, wondering if the engineer actually had the slightest idea what she was thinking about. Not wanting to be too forward, she decided to be subtle about her intentions, and, once they had arrived at the firehouse, timidly asked if Holtzmann wanted to watch TV for a bit before they’d go to bed.

“Sure, whatever you want, hot stuff”, Holtzmann gave back at once, making the physicist smile a bit; they moved on to said couch, and quickly found something to watch on TV, the engineer noticing how Erin took in quite a deep breath before she snuggled up to her.

Again, she wondered what was going on - Erin had seemed a bit tense when they had walked back to the firehouse, but not in the bad way the engineer had noticed from her whenever she was getting nervous or anxious.

_ More like… expectant,  _ Holtzmann thought to herself, not sure what to think of this. Up to this point, she had been quite sure that she had made it clear to Erin that she expected nothing in return for these dates, and still…

On the other hand though, while Erin did seem nervous, it appeared to be a good kind of nervous, not the nervous which might end in a panic attack soon. And just then, Erin moved a bit on the couch so that she was facing her instead of looking towards the TV and kissed her; quite passionately, too.

Holtzmann could tell at once how much courage it had taken for Erin to do so. Even with the progress she made thanks to her therapy and the engineer’s constant support and reassurance, she was still terrified of rejection. So she kissed Erin back at once, unable to hold back a little moan when the physicist wrapped both arms around her and one of her hands entangled in her hair.

Quickly, the kiss turned into a make-out session, and Holtzmann had to keep reminding herself that she couldn’t just pounce Erin right then and there, no matter how much this turned her on. Then, Erin slid one hand beneath her shirt and caressed her back, and she groaned again, wondering if the physicist was aware how worked up this was making her.

“Holtz”, Erin mumbled, oddly breathless when they had pulled apart again at last, Holtzmann belatedly realizing that Erin somehow had ended up in her lap while they had been kissing, and was now practically straddling her, “I… I want to take this further. If you want to.”

“You know you don’t have to,” Holtzmann told her at once, even though the thought of making love to Erin made her insides clench in a good way, “we only do this if you’re really sure, you know that, right?”

“Yes.” Erin responded immediately, running her fingertips down the blonde’s spine and forcing her to grit her teeth, “I know. And I want this… I want  _ you _ , Holtz. I want to make love to you.”

She was blushing furiously, and Holtzmann could tell that while it hadn’t been easy for Erin to say this, she meant it. And so, she couldn’t hold back a giddy grin, the redhead smiling back at her shyly. She was still blushing as she came to her feet, but apparently not changing her mind as she held her hand out to the engineer.

Absolutely beaming at her, Holtzmann took hold of her hand, then came to her feet and kissed her gently before asking if they should go upstairs. Erin nodded bravely, feeling more aroused than nervous at this point (even though the nervousness wasn’t fully gone, and probably wouldn’t be for a while).

Erin was experiencing a conflicting range of emotions as she went to the bedroom with Holtzmann, knowing what was going to happen there. She was excited about spending the night that intimate way with the engineer, but she was also nervous and anxious, thoughts about how this was all Holtzmann wanted from her and that she’d drop her like a hot potato afterwards going wild in her mind.

She tried her best to ignore these thoughts, telling herself that certainly, Holtzmann would - and could - have gotten that kind of release easier and elsewhere if that had been all she wanted. However, those doubts came back in full force when it seemed as if the engineer was in a rush to get this over with as quickly as possible. She kissed her deeply the moment her back was touching the mattress, barely touching her breasts for a second before her hand slid further south, hurriedly removing her clothes until she was naked beneath her.

It felt good, despite her fears and worries, and it was clear Holtzmann knew what she was doing. It didn’t take long until Erin gasped as she came, holding back the urge to cry out, her fingers digging into the blanket as she trembled under the blonde’s skilled touch.

(Phil had never liked her being loud the few rare times he actually had managed to make her climax, back at the beginning of their relationship)

_ She just wanted to get this over with,  _ she then thought to herself, breathing heavily as she tried to get her racing heart under control,  _ now she’ll expect you to get her off, and then, this will be over. Well, at least you could enjoy it for a while, and at least she faked being in love with you well enough that you believed it, for a bit… _

“Okay”, Holtzmann said, as if to confirm all the dark thoughts running through Erin’s mind, “now that this has been taken care of…”

Erin expected her to tell her that it was her turn now, that she expected something in return for the orgasm she had given her. Instead, Holtzmann kissed her again, slowly and tenderly this time, running one hand from her thigh up her side to her face and cupping her jaw so gently that for a moment, Erin was sure she was imagining the almost feather-like touch.

“What are you doing?” She demanded to know, pulling back from the kiss and looking at the engineer in confusion, “you already… I mean…”

“Erin,” Holtzmann replied, immediately getting what the physicist was talking about even though she hadn’t been all too coherent, “sweet, lovely Erin. I’m gonna do the best I can, because I want to take my sweet time with this and make sure you feel beyond amazing, but I can’t do that if you’re dying to come from what I’m guessing is  _ months _ of sexual frustration, as you were. Now please, relax, and don’t worry about anything. Just enjoy, and tell me in case I do something you don’t like, okay?”

“Um, okay”, Erin gave back, not quite sure what to think of this. Here she’d been certain that Holtzmann didn’t find her attractive the slightest after all, and had just wanted to get this over with quickly, and yet here the blonde was now, looking at her as if she was truly desirable and not a pathetic, anxious mess.

Holtzmann gave her another smile, then kissed her again, another slow and tender kiss, one which made goosebumps break out all over her body. She closed her eyes almost automatically, and gave her best to relax, aided considerably by Holtzmann running a gentle hand down her body, skilfully avoiding the still sore spots on her ribcage. Even though the bruises had mostly faded at this point, only a few lightly yellow marks remaining, Erin was still amazed at the way Holtzmann apparently cared.

_ She remembers _ , Erin realized, astonished,  _ she remembers where they were and she doesn’t want to hurt me. Holtz doesn’t want to hurt me. _

She felt the engineer pull back from the kiss, but before her mind could betray her again and make her wonder if this meant Holtz had changed her mind and didn’t want her after all, the blonde moved a bit and started kissing her neck, immediately picking up on the shudder which ran through Erin’s body in response.

Erin wondered, then, if this had been a lucky guess, or if Holtzmann somehow already had known that being kissed there was one of the things which turned her on beyond reason.

_ If she hadn’t known before, she certainly did now, _ Erin realized, unable to hold back a moan when Holtzmann ran her tongue from below her ear to where her neck met her shoulder, her hand simultaneously moving to cup one breast, a calloused thumb gently rubbing the nipple until it hardened at her touch.

Leaving a trail of gentle, feather-like kisses, Holtzmann made her way from her neck to her other breast, giving it an experimental brief flick with her tongue to see how Erin would react. When the physicist’s breath hitched audibly, she deemed it a good thing to do and lowered her mouth, smirking against the redhead’s breast when she heard her moan softly in reply.

_ And I haven’t even really gotten started yet,  _ she thought to herself, not counting the quick orgasm she had given Erin just to take the edge off,  _ I’m going to make you feel so good, love, you’ll forget your own name. _

This was her one and only goal for the evening; make Erin feel good, amazing, loved, and desired. She kept caressing her tenderly with one hand as she made use of her mouth first on one breast, then on the other, the way Erin shuddered beneath her telling her that she was doing something right.

“All good?” she asked after a while, lifting her head to look at the redhead. Erin nodded, not trusting herself to speak, and Holtzmann smiled at her before she went back to what the physicist could only describe as worshipping her, kissing her way from her breasts down her stomach to her thighs, a small moan escaping the redhead when she felt the engineer trail her tongue over the inside of one of her legs afterwards.

And then, as if that wasn’t turning her on enough yet, Holtzmann ran her tongue over her folds, and she couldn’t hold back a breathless cry. The engineer paused and looked up at her, just to make sure this had been a noise of pleasure and not dismay, smirking when Erin nodded the moment their eyes met.

“Don’t hold back on my account, hot stuff.” Holtzmann smirked, lowering her head again and placing another kiss on the inside of Erin’s thigh. She wouldn’t be surprised if Phil had also had something to say about  _ that _ , and she didn’t want the physicist to worry about any such thing tonight. Tonight was meant for Erin to be able to relax, to let herself go and not hold back, and Holtzmann was more than a little determined to get Erin screaming her name. Shooting Erin another wink, Holtzmann went back to the task at hand, revelling in the moans she managed to draw out of the other woman.

“Oh God”, the physicist let out after Holtzmann had done her thing for a while, and had shown her how skilled exactly she was with her tongue. The blonde seemed to have an uncanny knack to quickly figure out what Erin liked the most, and it didn’t take long until Erin shuddered again as she quickly approached another climax.

“Oh God”, she repeated, louder this time, fingers gripping the blanket tight again while her hips twitched. Not even this deterred Holtzmann, though. She simply went along with it as if she had expected it, and a short while later, Erin moaned the blonde’s name as she came again, trembling beneath her.

Breathing heavily, Erin tried to calm her racing heart, trying and failing to remember the last time she had felt like this. Not even during the rare times Phil had actually managed to make her climax, she had felt like  _ this _ \- this good, this  _ loved _ \-  and to her astonishment, Holtzmann was clearly far from done, smirking at her and winking before she lowered her head again.

And not long after that, Erin forgot all inhibitions as Holtzmann made her scream for the first, but certainly not for the last time.

* * *

“Okay,” Erin brought out in a trembling voice quite a while later, head slumping back onto the pillow, “That’s it. Enough. I’m going to die if you keep this up.”

“Awww,” Holtzmann let out, pouting at her, “but I don’t even have lusty lockjaw yet. You sure you can’t take another one?”

“One hundred percent sure,” Erin told her at once, a bit stunned by the blonde’s stamina, “I can barely feel my legs anymore as it is!”

“Alriiiiiight”, the engineer drawled, moving up so she could lie down next to Erin, smiling at her as she absent-mindedly drew complicated patterns on the redhead’s bare stomach. Erin was smiling back at her almost as radiantly as she had pre-Phil, practically glowing after the things Holtzmann had made her feel.

“Thank you,” she blurted out, earning a confused look from the engineer, “for, um… you know…” She blushed, then cleared her throat, finding it hard to look the blonde in the eye all at once, but speaking on nonetheless, just another small sign for the progress she was making.

“I don’t…” she began, then trailed off again and started over, Holtzmann moving her hand to grasp the physicist’s, “no one ever… made me feel like this. So… I don’t know, so… special. Desirable. Beautiful.”

Her voice had gotten softer and softer as she had spoken, and by the last few words, Holtzmann had to strain her ears to hear her. Despite that, the engineer’s heart broke at the confession that no one ever had made Erin feel that way, when she deserved to feel like this every second of every day. She had known that what Erin had had with Phil had been a catastrophe that didn’t even deserve the title of ‘relationship’, but that the other men in her life hadn’t managed to make her feel this way, either…

“Erin,” she said, while the physicist swallowed heavily, clearly fighting to hold back tears all at once, “cupcake. My lovely, sweetest Erin. If it’s up to me, and if you’ll let me, I’ll make you feel like this every day for the rest of my life. And if I die before you, I’ll come back as a ghost so I can keep doing it.”

At this, Erin lost the fight, feeling pathetic and embarrassed again as she let out a little sob. Holtzmann pulled her into her embrace immediately, holding her close and rubbing her back, mumbling soothing words into her ear in an attempt to calm her down.

“I’m sorry,” Erin brought out after just sobbing quietly for a while, “I didn’t… God, I don’t even know why I’m crying. I’m sorry…”

She felt horrible. Here she was, after Holtzmann had made her feel so amazing, repaying the engineer by crying in her arms for no reason. And to make her feel even worse, she belatedly realized that she hadn’t even returned the favour. Holtzmann literally had made her scream more than once and she hadn’t done anything at all for her.

“It’s okay”, the engineer kept reassuring her, still rubbing her back soothingly, “don’t feel bad, it’s okay…”

Erin hid her face in response, burying it in the other woman’s neck. It took her a while, but finally, she managed to calm down, still feeling bad though by the time she finally looked up at Holtzmann again.

“I’m sorry for freaking out like that.” she apologized again, finding it hard to look the engineer in the eye, “You made me feel so good and I act like this… and I didn’t even… you know, repay you.”

“Ah, no worries about that.” Holtzmann gave back at once, earning a mildly surprised look from the other woman, “Tonight was all about you. Or can still be, if you’ve recovered enough.”

She grinned and even leered a bit, and Erin found herself unable to hold back a roll of her eyes, earning a snicker from the engineer, the physicist’s dry tone when she responded only making Holtzmann feel better, as it was a glimpse of the old Erin coming back to the surface.

“I’m starting to worry that this is some underhanded attempt at killing me.” Erin said, Holtzmann cackling in response, “because if you… make me feel like that one more time, I think my heart will just give up.”

“Okay, okay”, Holtzmann said with another snicker, “no more, then. Well, not today, at least. After a night of sleep, you should be good to go again, no?” She waggled her eyebrows at Erin, the other woman looking at her in disbelief. A small, but not exactly quiet part of her still having been quite sure that, after this night, Holtzmann would drop her like a hot potato. Clearly though, not only did the engineer have no such plans, but she seemed more than willing - eager, even - to make her feel this way again.

“And don’t you get any worries about ‘repaying me’, as you put it.” the blonde went on, “I only want you to do so once you’re really comfortable with it, okay? Not to mention that looking at you as you screamed my name was so hot, that was satisfying enough all by itself.”

At this, Erin blushed and fidgeted a bit, Phil’s voice flashing through her mind unbidden, remarking snidely on how she was too loud and how vulgar this was. She let that voice speak through her before she had a chance to realize that these thoughts weren’t her own.

“Really?” she said, doubtful, “I always think it’s… you know. Too much.”

“No way”, Holtzmann gave back at once, figuring out quickly where this was coming from. Having suspected it, even. _No surprise there,_ she sourly thought to herself, an emotion she made sure to not let show through her features, knowing Erin would only interpret it as directed at her, no matter how much progress she had made so far. _Of course that slimebag had something to nag about when it came to_ that _, as well._ _I wonder, is there anything he didn’t criticize about her? What an ass._

“Nothing can ever be too much when it comes to that”, she said out loud, with a wink and a smirk, quite skillfully hiding her anger at Phil, “I don’t ever want you to hold back about stuff, okay? If you feel like being loud, be as loud as you want. It’s quite hot, actually.”

At this, Erin blushed, but didn’t try to contradict her. Instead, she snuggled up to her, not caring the slightest that they both were fully naked at this point - even though she did wonder when exactly Holtzmann had undressed, not quite able to remember, having been too distracted by the things Holtzmann had been doing to her.

Not wanting the physicist to freeze, Holtzmann quickly pulled the blanket over both of them, then made sure that Erin was comfortable, moving one hand to play with her hair afterwards, earning a content sigh from the physicist.

“...Holtz?” Erin broke the comfortable silence which had formed between them after a while, earning a questioning “hmmm” from the other woman. She cleared her throat, feeling her cheeks heat up, glad that the room was somewhat dark by now - even though she was quite sure that Holtzmann was all too aware of her blush anyway.

“I… I really enjoyed… all of this”, she said haltingly, “and… you know… being with you. I… you mean a lot to me, Holtzmann…”

It was the closest she could come to actually telling her how she felt, and she briefly felt frustrated at her inability to properly articulate these feelings. Certainly Holtzmann would laugh at her now, and ask her if she was serious, if this was all she’d get… and then, Holtzmann pulled her closer and pressed a tender kiss to the top of her head, and Erin could hear the smile in her voice, a genuine and happy one, and none which mocked her in any way.

“I’m glad”, Holtzmann said, playing with a few strands of her hair and making her feel oddly sleepy as she relaxed again, relieved that Holtzmann wasn’t mad at her for her inability to speak properly of what she felt, “you mean a lot to me, too, Erin. And I’m glad I get to make you happy, I’m so lucky.”

Erin just smiled, and let out a small sigh as her eyes fell close. And just before she drifted off into sleep, she heard Holtzmann whisper “I love you” to her, and a small smile curled her lips.

_ Maybe I love you, too, _ she thought to herself before she fell asleep. Holtzmann just held her close as she slumbered, replaying Erin’s words until she drifted off into slumber as well, a blissful smile still on her face.


	43. Chapter 43

When Erin awoke in the next morning, she felt relaxed and happy, better than she had in quite a while. She blushed a bit when she realized that she was naked beneath the covers, smiling to herself as she thought back to the previous night, to how amazing Holtzmann had made her feel, only for all her fears and worries to make a grand return when she realized she was alone in the bed. Because what if this had been all Holtzmann wanted after all? Erin felt her heart rate quicken as her mind began conjuring up terrible images of Holtzmann sneaking out and leaving her, having gotten what she truly had wanted from her, and dropping her now that she had made her feel so good, but hadn’t been given anything in return.

_ Don’t be stupid, _ she tried to calm herself down, her breath quickening despite her efforts,  _ you’re at the firehouse, in  _ her _ bedroom. Where would she go? There’s a perfectly reasonable explanation for this, maybe she just had to go to the bathroom or… _

She heard footsteps from the hallway and her racing heart slowed down a bit, but she knew that it might as well be Abby or Patty or even Kevin, momentarily forgetting it was Saturday… and then Holtzmann stepped into the room, carrying a brown paper bag from Starbucks and two paper cups, and Erin nearly felt like crying again, from sheer relief this time.

“Good morning hot stuff”, Holtzmann beamed at her, holding up the items she had brought, “I bring breakfast. Apple-cinnamon muffins and pumpkin spice latte.”

“Aw”, Erin let out, blinking her eyes rapidly as she fought the urge to cry, telling herself that there was no reason to shed tears, “you’re too good to me.”

“Nothing can ever be too good for you, cupcake”, Holtzmann told her, handing her one of the coffees to her before she opened the paper bag and pulled out a muffin, sitting down next to her as she handed it to her, as well, grinning when she took note of the fact that Erin apparently just had woken up and hadn’t put any clothes on yet.

“Oooh”, she let out, making Erin blush again, even though the physicist smiled a bit at the sparkle in the engineer’s eyes, “naked breakfast in bed. I like.”

“You’re not naked”, Erin pointed out, only to nearly groan at Holtzmann’s response, all too aware that she had perfectly set herself up for that one.

“Well”, the blonde said, already unbuttoning her shirt, “that can be changed easily.”

“Holtzmann”, was all Erin could say, blushing a bit again, but not trying to stop the engineer as she stripped in record time, then joined the physicist in bed again. Erin found herself glad that it was Saturday morning and that therefore there was no danger of any of the others walking in on them. She wasn’t sure if she’d be able to live with that level of humiliation.

As she took a careful bite of the muffin, then a sip of her coffee, Erin found herself thinking the whole situation an oddly pleasant one, considering how weird and strange it should have felt. Here they were, naked in bed on a Saturday morning, probably getting crumbs everywhere, something she never had done before with anyone - and certainly not with Phil, who saw breakfast as a necessity and not something to be enjoyed, let alone naked in bed with his girlfriend - and she felt good and content, smiling a bit as she took another sip of coffee.

“This is nice.” she tried once more to articulate what she felt, still a bit frustrated about her failure to do so the previous evening, “You know, I don’t think I ever did something like that before. Possibly because we’re getting crumbs all over the bed.”

“We can vaccuum those away before we go to sleep tonight”, Holtzmann shrugged, making the redhead smile slightly again, “and I’ve eaten Pringles and other stuff in bed so often, I don’t even notice the mess anymore.”

“I think I would.” Erin told her, and then immediately felt bad for saying this. Phil never had liked it when she had talked back like this, and certainly, Holtzmann wouldn’t either, the engineer would get mad now for sure… so Erin felt quite surprised when the younger woman, instead of getting mad, let out a snort, then a chuckle and nodded, smirking at her afterwards, not angry the slightest.

And once again, Erin realized that, even though she was making progress, she still hadn’t gotten nearly as far as she had dared to hope, feeling bad despite the kindness in Holtzmann’s eyes.

“Quite likely.” the engineer said with a smirk, then finished her muffin, the final piece she popped into her mouth so big that it made her cheeks bulge. Erin let out a little giggle, then, giving in to a sudden impulse, leaned in and kissed Holtzmann on one rounded cheek, still smiling when she pulled back again.

“Soooo”, Holtzmann started once she had managed to gulp down the muffin, “not to be too forward, but have you recovered from yesterday’s activities?”

“I think so”, Erin gave back, feeling simultaneously touched and oddly giddy at the thought of Holtzmann touching her like this again, and it probably was the giddiness which spoke through her when she continued.

“I got quite sweaty yesterday though”, she let the engineer know, smiling and blushing at the sparkle which appeared in Holtzmann’s eyes at her words, “so perhaps we should shower first… Um, if you feel like joining me…”

“The day I don’t feel like joining you is the day I died, hot stuff”, Holtzmann told her, causing her blush to deepen. She smiled shyly, then got out of bed, all too aware of her nakedness, but the way Holtzmann was looking at her helped with making her feel less self-conscious, the unveiled desire and passion in the engineer’s eyes making her heart speed up.

Clearly eager to get into the shower with her, Holtzmann hopped out of bed, obviously caring much less about her lack of clothes. She grasped Erin’s hand and beamed at her, sounding quite excited when she asked if she was ready, then.

“Yes”, Erin replied with a little laugh, touched again by the engineer’s eagerness. Holtzmann gave her another bright smile, then they headed to the bathroom together, Erin feeling a bit nervous again, but excited, as well, looking forward to the things Holtzmann would soon make her feel.

* * *

The shower had taken much longer than it would have been reasonable, but Erin couldn’t say that she had minded. Once again, what Holtzmann had done to her could only be described as worshipping her, and now, she felt relaxed and content as she toweled herself dry, the engineer doing the same next to her, humming to herself.

Holtzmann was feeling just as good as Erin did, happy that she had managed to make her cry out yet again, and still running on the high from an Erin who had  _ insisted _ on returning the favour. Now though, she noticed that the physicist was pausing in her movements and studying herself in the mirror, glancing at her from the corner of her eye, wondering what Erin was thinking about.

If she had been able to read minds, she would have felt an odd conflict of emotions, sad and happy at the same time. Erin, for the first time in weeks, was taking a closer look at herself, and not quite sure what to think when it felt oddly  _ wrong  _ to see her upper body with barely any bruising remaining, just a few yellow-ish marks showing where the worst of the bruises had been.

And not only were they gone, but she could see much less of her ribs, too, than she had when things had been at their worst with Phil. And as she realized that, Erin thought back to all the times Holtzmann had claimed she couldn’t finish her food and had implored her to eat it so it wouldn’t go to waste, to the countless muffins and donuts and cupcakes the engineer had shared with her and all the other moments Holtzmann had made sure she’d eat properly.

Only now, she fully realized what Holtzmann had done for her, and swallowed heavily, feeling close to tears once more. Clearly, the engineer noticed as much, since she gave her a concerned look, the same emotion in her voice when she spoke up. “Erin? Cupcake? You okay?”

“Fine”, Erin told her, suddenly just  _ knowing  _ that she wouldn’t be able to put what she was feeling into words. She made herself smile at the engineer, and after a moment, Holtzmann smiled back at her, briefly touching her hand, voice and eyes kind now as she replied.

“Alright”, she said, earning a weak smile from the physicist, “I’ll get dressed then and head to the lab. Join me there when you’re done?”

Erin nodded, and Holtzmann stole a tender kiss before she left the bathroom. Erin looked in the mirror again the moment the door had closed behind the blonde, studying her upper body again, then turning so she could get a look at her back, the bruising gone completely from there, not even some of the yellow marks she could still see on her ribcage remaining.

It still felt oddly wrong, and she couldn’t quite say why… But she tried to push these thoughts aside, telling herself that this was how it should be; not the bruised mess she had been right after the break-up with Phil.

Finally, Erin tore her gaze from her reflection and moved to get dressed, thinking of Holtzmann again as she did so, of all the things the engineer had done for her in the past months. Again, she found herself thinking about her feelings, and all at once felt a bit overwhelmed as her heart seemed to swell in her chest. She swallowed heavily, taking a few deep breaths to calm herself down, then told herself that she could do this as she left the bathroom and moved on to the lab, where Holtzmann was already tinkering away at one of her workbenches, the engineer looking up though when Erin entered.

“Hey cupcake”, she said, smiling brightly, and Erin felt her heart swell again, and before she could stop herself, the words practically blurted out, prompting Holtzmann to pause her work and give her a curious and slightly concerned look.

“Um, I”, Erin said, wringing her hands nervously, “I have to… tell you something.”

“Okay?” Holtzmann gave back, putting down her tools, sensing that this was something important, judging from the way Erin was fidgeting nervously, and found it hard to look at her. Briefly, she worried that Erin had changed her mind and would tell her she wanted to break up with her. It had been something Holtzmann had mentally been preparing herself for, of course, but she also knew she’d been letting her guard down these past weeks. More and more, it had seemed like Erin actually  _ wanted _ to stick around, actually liking Holtzmann the way Holtzmann liked her. And so the engineer had begun to hope, and had begun to dream, and had in the process forgotten to remind herself that this was probably only temporary. That Erin would want to ditch her for someone better at some point. That those words and gestures about her liking Holtzmann were really only meant in a friend or family way.

_ You told her,  _ she then remind herself, while Erin took several more deep breaths and tried to keep her composure,  _ you told her that if she ever wants to end this, it’s fine. So let her say whatever is on her mind and then deal with it. You should have seen this coming… _

“I, um”, Erin started, then swallowed heavily, fixing some point behind Holtzmann’s shoulder, “I wanted to tell you that… that I… I really… like all of this. Not just what we… did last night and this morning but… you know, um, being with you. Like this.”

She blushed furiously at this point, fingers fidgeting as her gaze dropped to the floor. Sensing that she had more to say though, Holtzmann remained quiet, only took a step closer to and reaching out to place her hand on the redhead’s, stilling the hectic movement of her fingers. She still wasn’t sure what this meant - for all she knew, this could be an ‘it’s not you, it’s me’ type of break-up conversation - but she knew she had to let Erin speak, had to let the other woman get this off her mind.

Erin took in another deep breath, then forced herself to look up so her eyes met the engineer’s, and Holtzmann felt her heart clench up as she was all too aware of how difficult this just had been for the redhead, and how much she was struggling to not look away again.

“Um, I”, Erin continued, voice trembling a bit now, prompting Holtzmann to squeeze her hand tenderly, “you mean a lot to me Holtz and… I… I think I… I think I love you.”

She fell silent and swallowed, her nervousness only growing as she waited for Holtzmann’s reaction. She felt as if it hadn’t been enough, as if she had beaten around the bush too long for the words to have any true meaning, but clearly, Holtzmann thought differently, her eyes watering suspiciously as she smiled at the physicist.

“Thank you for telling me this, Erin...” she said, squeezing her hand again, making Erin smile shyly as well, “and I love you, too. But, umm… You knew that already.” Holtzmann laughed nervously, trying to keep her own excitement from showing too much. Because Erin loved her.

_ Erin Gilbert loved her. _

Holtzmann wanted nothing more than to kiss her senseless right there and then, but she was still all too aware of how Erin would still flinch at too many sudden movements. Instead, she just held Erin, the physicist having hugged her as she didn’t trust herself to say anything in response, not wanting to ruin this moment that they had. Erin closed her eyes as she hid her face against the other woman’s shoulder, still feeling as if what she had said hadn’t been enough… but Holtzmann had looked so  _ happy _ , she supposed it was better than nothing at all.


	44. Chapter 44

After their first night together, and after how Erin had told Holtzmann that she loved her for the first time, the physicist felt a bit better about their relationship. She was less worried about Holtzmann leaving her, and even those nagging doubts that she’d end up hurting Holtzmann in the long run slowly faded into background noise. It had helped that Holtzmann had seemed even more energetic than usual after Erin first spoke those three little words, smiling even more brightly to the point where Erin almost wondered if there was maybe a catch to all this.

When she brought this up with Holtzmann, the engineer just kissed her, telling her she was just happy to have Erin in her life, and Erin decided to stop questioning it too much. After all, if Holtzmann was happy, what was there to worry about?

She did find herself getting bothered by her inability to say those three little words with the same ease Holtzmann displayed, and to her dismay, it didn’t get easier as the weeks went by. She found herself wondering more and more why she couldn’t just say it, by now quite sure that she meant it. And as autumn turned to winter, and Christmas approached, Erin decided that she’d have to bring this up with Diana at some point, realizing that her troubles with telling Holtzmann how she felt might have more to do with Phil and what he had done to her than she perhaps was aware of.

The idea that somehow, he was responsible for the troubles she had with telling Holtzmann this, made her angry at him for the first time in a long while. If he had entered the room in this very moment, she might have ended up yelling at him, or perhaps even smacking him, simply for doing something to her which had a bad effect for Holtzmann.

_ Holtzmann’s so good to you and you can’t even tell her that you love her without stuttering and it’s all his fault _ , she thought to herself a few days before Christmas, fingers fidgeting, then clenching into fists.

(It perhaps said quite a bit about her that she only got mad at him when what he had done to her had an effect on Holtzmann, but she didn’t make that mental connection. Not yet.)

“Hey hot stuff”, the engineer’s voice distracted her from her thoughts, as if she had summoned her by thinking about her. Erin shuddered briefly at the thought, hoping it wouldn’t work that way with Phil, not wanting to run into him again anytime soon. “I have a question.”

“Okay?” Erin gave back, trying hard to not get nervous and fidgety. Surely, if Holtzmann had anything unpleasant to ask of her, she wouldn’t do it to deliberately hurt her. The engineer had been nothing but kind and sweet to her, so she wouldn’t ask her something unpleasant or mean now; not on purpose, at least.

Holtzmann smiled at her, all too aware of how she got nervous, and sat down next to her, taking tender hold of her hand in an attempt to calm her down. “I was just wondering”, the blonde then said, fidgeting a bit herself now, “well, you know, Christmas is coming up and… you wanna celebrate? A little bit? Just the two of us?”

Erin already knew that Abby and Patty had plans for Christmas, but she had avoided making any so far. She had skillfully ignored her parents’ calls for both Thanksgiving and Christmas, not wanting to face their questions and the certain reproach she’d get for no longer dating Phil.

(She remembered he had been good with her parents, how easily they had trusted him, how they had told her how good he was for her… She wasn’t sure how they’d react when Erin told them how wrong they had been, or if they would even believe her.)

And while they had all celebrated Thanksgiving at the firehouse, Erin hadn’t even considered her Christmas plans thus far. She quickly pushed any lingering thoughts of Phil form her mind, before turning back to Holtzmann, who was looking at her and waiting for her answer.

“Um, sure”, she said, smiling a bit at the idea, liking the thought of Christmas with Holtzmann, “I’d like that…”

Holtzmann beamed brightly at her, making her wonder if she already had made plans before actually asking her if she wanted to celebrate. She was somewhat glad the engineer had asked her, because she wanted to give Holtzmann a present. Something small, and perhaps not all too creative, but it would be better than nothing.

_ She’d have to order it online, _ she thought to herself, because the mere thought of going out shopping alone made her nervous, and going with Holtzmann would ruin the surprise. And undoubtedly, Abby and Patty had better things to do than take her to the mall, so…

“I’ll get us a nice dinner, if you’d like me to”, Holtzmann said, distracting her again from her own mind, “and after that we can just relax a bit? Just a nice quiet evening, you know.”

Erin nodded her agreement, smiling at the engineer. Holtzmann beamed back at her, then leaned in for a brief, but tender kiss, rubbing her hands with glee afterwards.

“Excellent.” she said, Erin’s smile widening at her enthusiasm, “this is gonna be awesome, and I’ll wear the gaudiest Christmas sweater I can find.”

At this, Erin let out a little giggle, and Holtzmann’s smile grew even wider. She kissed her on the cheek once more, then changed the topic by asking if they should head back to the lab and get some more work done. Erin nodded at once, eager to help her and feel useful, even though her mind kept wandering to the upcoming celebration and thoughts about what she could get for Holtzmann.

* * *

“Oh, my God.” Erin was unable to hold the exclamation back as Holtzmann presented her sweater with a “Ta-daa!” and by spreading her arms wide. She hadn’t exaggerated when she had said that she would wear the gaudiest Christmas sweater she could find, now grinning at the physicist’s reaction as all Erin could do was stare.

Not only was the sweater a terrible mix of red and green, with little reindeers dancing across Holtzmann’s chest, but it had lights, too. The little LED lamps shone almost as brightly as the engineer’s grin, and even though Erin felt bad for laughing at her and feared it might make her angry, she couldn’t hold back a little giggle, quickly covering her mouth with one hand to hide it.

“Laugh all you want, hot stuff.” Holtzmann said, smirking and looking oddly pleased with herself despite - or maybe because of - Erin’s reaction. “I know how awful this thing looks. That’s what makes it so great!”

“It has lights”, Erin giggled, unable to hold the laughter back any longer. Holtzmann beamed at her, happy that she had made her laugh, and nodded proudly, twirling on the spot so Erin could get a good look at the horrible sweater.

“Is it safe to hug you?” Erin wanted to know once Holtzmann was facing her again, “or is there danger of electrocution?”

“Nah”, the engineer reassured her, “I wouldn’t wear it if it meant that there’d be no Erin hugs.”

She opened her arms, and Erin moved to embrace her, a small, content sigh escaping her when she felt Holtzmann’s arms wrap around her. The lights were poking her a bit, but she didn’t mind much, resting her head on the engineer’s shoulder and breathing in her scent, feeling safe and content.

“I, um”, she broke the silence after half a minute of just enjoying the hug, “I got you a little something…”

She blushed a bit as she pulled back from the hug, still not sure if she had gotten a good gift for the blonde, especially when Holtzmann started to look all excited. Clearing her throat, Erin moved to her desk, where she kept the present in one of the drawers, neatly wrapped and with a little bow on top.

“It’s not much”, she mumbled as she made her way back to where Holtzmann was standing, not wanting the blonde to expect God knew what and then be disappointed, “just… a little something?”

Unable to stop herself, Erin began to fidget nervously as Holtzmann tore into the wrapping paper, clearly eager to get her gift. She gasped once the paper had been removed and she saw what it was, looking up at Erin with her eyes shining afterwards.

“A little something?” she repeated, the happy smile on her face making Erin give back a shy smile of her own, “Are you kidding me? That’s a brand new iPod!”

“Yours started to look kinda beat-up.” Erin replied, her fingers still twitching despite Holtzmann’s positive reaction. “So I figured I might as well get you a new one… You, um, you like it, then?”

“I love it”, Holtzmann reassured her, giving her another happy grin, “man, I’ll fill this thing up with music. Thank you.”

Her smile turned tender as she pulled the physicist close for a gentle kiss. Glad and happy that Holtzmann liked her gift, Erin had a few seconds to feel less nervous - until Holtzmann told her that she had something for her, as well, and she immediately started to worry that her gift would pale in comparison, that it’d be worth much less and that Holtzmann would get angry at her after all.

Her worries only grew when Holtzmann rushed to her locker, and Erin saw the size of the gift when she came back. It was much bigger than her meagre package, and she only got more nervous at the sight of it, swallowing heavily when Holtzmann held it out to her with another happy grin.

“Open it, open it!” she said excitedly once Erin had taken it from her. Erin gave her an insecure look, then carefully removed the wrapping paper, the way it had been haphazardly taped into place showing that Holtzmann had been quite excited when she had wrapped the gift.

Erin’s breath got caught in her throat when she had removed enough of the paper to see what it was.

“You said that Douchey McDouche threw them all out”, Holtzmann said in an uncharacteristically soft voice as Erin stared at the box set of Taylor Swift albums, said box proudly proclaiming that it was the  _ Limited Collector’s Edition _ , “so I got you these. Um, I pulled a few strings, too, look at the top.”

Curious, Erin did, and her eyes went wide - because written onto the top of the box, with black marker, were the words “To Erin - With love XOXOXO” and an autograph she easily recognized as the singer’s, her mouth hanging open when she stared at Holtzmann.

“How did you...” she started, then heard the tremble in her voice and paused, taking a few controlled breaths before trying again, “how did you manage that?”

“Told you, pulled a few strings”, Holtzmann shrugged, smiling at the physicist’s gobsmacked reaction, “Jennifer Lynch helped. You like it?”

“So much!” Erin squeaked, throwing her arms around Holtzmann for an enthusiastic embrace, “I love it! Thank you so much Holtz, I…”

It was just like the first time she had tried to tell Holtzmann that she loved her,  _ something _ making it impossible for her to just say the words. She took in a controlled breath, then tried again, some of her joy fading at the tremble she heard in her voice. “I love it. I… I love y-you. Thank you.”

“Nothing to thank me for.” Holtzmann smiled, gently kissing her cheek before she continued, “I’m just glad you like it. And I love you too.”

Erin hugged her again then, revelling in the feeling of Holtzmann’s arms around hers… but wondering why she couldn’t just tell her she loved her, and if her inability to do so hurt Holtzmann more than she’d admit.

* * *

Fitting for the season, Diana had a plate of cookies in her office at their next appointment, and Erin took one when the therapist offered them to her, just to be polite. Diana gave her one of what Erin by now had taken to calling her “therapist smiles”, then asked her how she was doing, earning a small shrug from the physicist.

“Okay, I guess?” she then said, winning some time by nibbling the cookie before she continued, “Um, Holtzmann and I celebrated Christmas, that was very nice. And there was another bust, which was good, too…”

She trailed off, trying to figure out how to bring her troubles up with the therapist. Sensing that there was something bothering her, Diana remained quiet, giving her time to collect her thoughts until finally, Erin spoke up again. Her voice was slow and halting, but not trailing off into silence, Erin eager to get the words out and perhaps receive some sort of solution from the elder woman.

“I, um, I tried to… tell Holtzmann how I feel about her,” she let the therapist know, Diana listening in patient silence, “and it just… wouldn’t come out. She says it with such ease, and I know she means it, but when I tried to tell her… I can’t. I end up stuttering and stalling and I just can’t say it without sounding like a fool.”

“But this is how you feel about her?” Diana wanted to know, smiling when Erin nodded at once, without hesitating for a second, even though her smile faded again after another moment, her eyes still kind though when she continued.

“After what you told me about the relationship with Mr Hudson,” she said, Erin involuntarily frowning at hearing the man’s name, “and about his treatment of you… Erin, is it possible that you find it so difficult to tell Holtzmann what you feel because part of you is scared of her?”

“What?!” Erin gave back, not having expected this the slightest, “No! Why would I be scared of her?”

“You got out of an abusive relationship not all too long ago”, Diana pointed out, Erin feeling her stomach clench at the words “abusive relationship”. By now, she was all too aware that this was exactly what she had been in, but it still made her sick to her stomach. “And while it may seem ridiculous to you, or wrong, it’s a perfectly normal reaction to be wary of a new partner afterwards. Mr Hudson didn’t give you reason to be scared of him, either, did he? Not at first.”

“Well, no”, Erin had to admit, frowning, “but Holtz is not like him. She wouldn’t… do the things he did. Not ever.”

“And I don’t doubt this”, Diana reassured her, giving her another calming smile, “but the same part which might be scared of her might not realize this. Fears like these are hardly ever rational, Erin. Perhaps you should speak to her about this, it might be helpful for both of you.”

“Maybe”, Erin mumbled, but she already had made up her mind - she certainly would not tell Holtzmann any of this. The engineer had been so kind and good to her, so Erin wouldn’t repay her by telling her that her therapist thought part of her was afraid of the engineer.

She’d find another way to deal with this, she told herself, while Diana asked her another question which brought their talk away from Holtzmann, one which would not involve hurting the engineer and one which might not run things between them.


	45. Chapter 45

When Erin returned from the therapy session, Holtzmann noticed at once that something was bothering her, but knew better at this point than to just ask her. Instead, she simply asked how it had been, the physicist giving her a small smile as she responded.

“It was okay.” she let the engineer know. Holtzmann again had the feeling that Erin had something on her mind, but she didn’t want to pressure her. “quite… helpful again. How did your work go while I was gone?”

It was a clumsy attempt at changing the topic, but Holtzmann went with it anyway. She eagerly showed Erin the improvements she had made to the redhead’s shotgun, and Erin listened with a slight smile on her face, her hand on Holtzmann’s back as the blonde talked.

As the engineer spoke though, she thought back to what Diana had said, and nearly grimaced. She held back the urge to do so, not wanting Holtzmann to notice, and instead Erin pushed the thought out of her mind, focusing on what Holtzmann was saying again.

“...and I’m quite sure you can use this baby at our next bust, unless that happens today.” the engineer was telling her, making her smile again, “but of course I’ll test it before I let you use it.”

“You’re amazing, so I’m sure it will work just fine.” Erin smiled, the way Holtzmann beamed at her in response warming her heart. Her own smile widened, and she leaned in for a brief kiss, sighing in content when the blonde put both arms around her waist afterwards.

“I’ll have to head out to the store some time today.” Holtzmann said after they just had snuggled in comfortable silence for a minute or two, “My stash of Pringles is running dangerously low, and so is the Red Bull one. You wanna come?”

“Sure.” Erin decided after a moment, telling herself that it couldn’t hurt to get out of the firehouse more. This had gotten better with her regular therapy appointments, and even more so when she had started going on busts again, but she still spent a lot of her time cooped up at their headquarters, and knew that in the long run, this wouldn’t be good for her mental health.

“Awesome.” Holtzmann smiled, clearly happy that Erin would come with her. Erin smiled back at her, then nodded when the engineer suggested that they could go once she’d finished the current stage of the weapon she was working on, earning a look of alarm when she told the physicist that, if they’d just walk off now, the shotgun was likely to go poof in their absence.

“But no worries.” Holtzmann quickly added at Erin’s worried look, “I’ll make sure it’ll be perfectly safe before we leave.”

“Okay”, Erin replied, with another worried look at the weapon. The engineer winked at her, then went back to work, and half an hour later, she declared the project safe and asked Erin if she was ready to leave.

Bravely, the physicist nodded, earning another bright smile from the younger woman. She felt a bit better when Holtzmann pulled on her leather jacket, always having liked how the engineer looked in it, telling herself that it’d be okay as she put on her own coat.

Always one for physical displays of affection, Holtzmann took tender hold of her hand as they stepped out of the firehouse. Erin smiled at her as the engineer’s fingers curled around hers, and took in a deep breath of the crisp winter air, all at once feeling happy and content, the dark thoughts Diana had brought up for once not plaguing her mind.

“What a nice day.” she said out loud, making Holtzmann nod next to her, the engineer beaming at her as she squeezed the physicist’s hand, “I’m glad I agreed to come with you.”

“Happy to hear, cupcake”, Holtzmann said, and then added something, but all at once, Erin couldn’t hear what the blonde was saying anymore, her blood rushing in her ears and her breath getting caught in her suddenly constricted throat.

A few steps ahead, a man was crossing the street, and at the first glance, Erin had been sure that it was Phil, down to the retreating hairline and the man’s love for v-necks. At the second, closer look, she realized that it wasn’t her ex, but not even that helped anymore, the iron band of panic tight around her chest, making it impossible for her to breathe.

“Erin,” she heard Holtzmann say, the engineer sounding alarmed, “cupcake? What is it? Erin?”

“...thought it’s… him.” Erin brought out, a shudder running through her. Sudden tears stung in her eyes, and she told herself not to be ridiculous. It  _ hadn’t  _ been Phil, there was no reason for her to panic or to cry. And even if it had been him, Holtzmann was right there next to her, in bright daylight, and he certainly wouldn’t have gone up to her to yell at her in the middle of a busy New York street.

“Erin, honey.” she heard the engineer say, the smaller woman never letting go of her hand as she moved so that she was in front of her, facing her, “It’s okay, it wasn’t him. And if it had been, I would have kicked his ass into next week. He’s never gonna touch you again, okay? If it’s up to me, he’ll never even  _ look  _ at you again. It’s okay.”

Slowly and carefully, not wanting to make her worse, the engineer moved to embrace her. The moment her arms were around Erin, the physicist clung to her, hiding her face in the other woman’s shoulder and struggling to breathe deep and evenly as Holtzmann rubbed her back reassuringly.

_ It’s okay,  _ she told herself, the younger woman mumbling reassuring, soothing words to her the whole time, holding her close and rubbing her back until the panic slowly started to ebb off again.

“Better?” Holtzmann asked once Erin could breathe a bit easier again. The physicist managed a quick nod, the way she kept her gaze focused on the ground breaking Holtzmann’s heart when she spoke up, her voice so soft that the engineer had to strain to hear her.

“I’m sorry...” Erin was saying, yet another apology for something which wasn’t her fault, Holtzmann thought to herself, angry at Phil all over again, “but… I want to go back home…”

“It’s okay.”, Holtzmann told her again, still rubbing her back soothingly, “You have nothing to be sorry for, okay? If you want to go back home, we’ll go back home.”

Erin still felt bad, but Holtzmann was smiling at her, and rubbing soothing circles on her back. The engineer kept her hand on the other woman’s back as they walked back to the firehouse, silently reassuring her that she was there and that everything was fine, even though Erin felt far from fine even once they had made it back to the safety of their headquarters.

* * *

For the rest of the day, Erin was quiet, even more so than usual. She still helped Holtzmann out in the lab, the best she could, but she seemed oddly distracted. It was something the engineer at first blamed on the panic attack, but as the hours went by and Erin’s state didn’t change, she realized that something else was off about her girlfriend.

She knew better than to simply ask though, knowing that it would only make Erin feel bad and like a burden again - especially after she’d had a panic attack mere hours ago - and so, she kept her worries to herself. Erin didn’t speak up about what was troubling her, either, even though the thoughts kept going round and round in her mind.

For the first time since she had started going to therapy, Erin was feeling frustrated. She had known that she wouldn’t magically get better from one day to the next, but still she had been hoping for more progress than this.  _ Because,  _ she thought to herself somewhat bitterly as they all sat around the table and had dinner, _ here she was, still crying for no reason, and having panic attacks out of nowhere, just because she had seen someone who had vaguely resembled Phil. _

“I’m going upstairs.” she mumbled, only having finished half of her food. Worried, Holtzmann nodded, and looked after her as she made her way upstairs, wanting to follow her, but figuring that Erin could need some alone time now, and willing to give her some space.

“Something’s off.” the engineer told Abby and Patty once she could be sure Erin was upstairs and out of earshot, feeling bad for talking about her behind her back like this, but unable to keep her worries inside, “with Erin, I mean. And I’m not sure how to help her…”

“I’ve seen her like this before.” Abby told her, taking a sip of her water before she went on, “Before the mess with Phil, I mean. She’s always acted like this when she was stewing over something. Sometimes, she’d be like this days at a time back in college.”

“Yikes”, Holtzmann let out, not liking the thought of Erin so oddly quiet and brooding for days at all. Feeling helpless, and once more cursing herself for how blind she had been, Abby just shrugged, then made herself smile at the engineer, giving her best to sound reassuring when she spoke up again.

“But Erin knows she can talk to you.” she let the blonde know, making her smile a bit again, as well, “And I think that sooner or later, she will. She is getting better about that…”

Nodding her agreement, Holtzmann picked up her fork again, and continued to eat; she finished quickly and went upstairs to join her girlfriend, figuring that by now, it’d be fine to do so, blissfully unaware of the explosion which was looming just below the surface.


	46. Chapter 46

For almost a week, Erin was silent and brooding, and even though it worried Holtzmann, she didn’t try to push the physicist about what was bothering her. Erin kept helping her out in the lab, and did so with her usual meticulous ways and high concentration, but Holtzmann could tell that her mind wandered every now and then.

With each day that passed, Holtzmann got more and more concerned, and she could tell that Abby and Patty were feeling the same way. And while the engineer held back questions and comments about something obviously bothering Erin, Abby gave up on doing so on the seventh day the redhead was in this state, unaware of what she would cause with her innocent question and good intentions.

“Erin?” she said as she approached the physicist, who was sitting on the couch and looking at a bunch of blueprints Holtzmann had given her, with the plea to check her calculations for mistakes - “So I don’t make us go poof, hot stuff”, she’d said, and even though Erin still was doubtful about her skills, she had agreed to look them over -, “um… you’ve been kinda quiet lately. Are you okay?”

For a few seconds, she wondered if Erin even had heard her, as the physicist didn’t react to her at all. Then, with slow and oddly controlled movements, Erin put the blueprints down onto the table in front of her and looked up at Abby - and the anger which suddenly blazed from her eyes nearly made the researcher take a step back.

“Am I okay?” Erin repeated, coming to her feet with a quickness that it startled Abby again. She had seen this look on Erin’s face before, a few rare times, the last time before the redhead had punched out the blogger guy for calling her a freak and telling her that she should be put back in therapy. And for a moment, she was almost sure that now, she’d be on the receiving end of a Gilbert punch, as Erin glared at her and clenched her fists.

Thankfully, no punching happened, but still Abby flinched when Erin replied. “Am. I. Okay.” Her voice was growing louder and louder, until she was shouting loud enough that Holtzmann heard her up on the second floor and came running. “What do you think, Abby? What  _ the fuck _ do you think?!”

It was so rare for Erin to drop f-bombs like this one that Abby went wide-eyed again while behind her, Holtzmann came to an almost screeching halt, not quite sure what had set this off, but not trying to stop it, either. So far, Erin never had let it show in any way, shape or form that she was as forgiving about what had happened as Abby and Patty might have thought until this very moment, and the engineer figured that it was time for the physicist to let some unpleasant truths come to the surface.

“No, I’m not okay!” Erin shouted before Abby could come up with a response, “And I think it’s pretty obvious I’m not! I’m pretty sure you noticed, but in case you thought it  _ might _ be something else entirely, let me spell it out for you, alright?”

She poked Abby in the chest with one finger, and Abby ended up sitting down in the nearest armchair, more out of surprise than due to the force of the poke. Not bothering to hold back a look of glee, Holtzmann moved to sit on the couch, taking the spot Erin had been using minutes ago, suddenly wishing for popcorn or Pringles as the redhead continued her tirade, still much louder than she normally spoke.

“I’ve been going to therapy for weeks now- No, for  _ months _ ”, she reminded Abby, glaring at her, “and it’s not. Getting. Better!  _ I’m _ not getting better! Do you think I like feeling this way? Do you think I  _ enjoy _ it? That I’m just doing this to piss you off?”

“Erin-” Aby began again, but Erin just kept yelling at her, making the other woman fall silent again.

“I still cry for no reason! The nightmares haven’t stopped! Hell, the other day I saw a guy who I thought was  _ him  _ and had a  _ fucking  _ panic attack, and if Holtz hadn’t been there, I would have thrown up right there on the sidewalk! I haven’t made a single bit of progress in  _ weeks _ , and you have the  _ audacity  _ to ask if I’m  _ okay _ ?!”

At this point, Patty had taken note of something going on in the living room area as well, and had come to see what was happening. Almost immediately, Erin zoomed in on her, prompting her to stop dead in her tracks as the physicist’s glare moved from Abby to her.

“And  _ you _ !” Erin shouted, Patty’s mouth falling open. She gave Abby a somewhat lost look, then noticed the way Holtzmann was smirking to herself and realized what was going on. It lessened the surprise of Erin’s next words a bit, but not how much they hurt. “If you had listened to Holtz none of this would have gotten so bad! This whole mess could have ended so much earlier because Holtzmann knew! She  _ knew  _ and she came to you for help and you  _ shot her down _ !”

“Erin”, Abby started, coming to her feet, “we’re sorry but--”

“Sit down!” Erin snapped at her, with so much venom in her voice that Abby practically fell back into her seat, “I’m not done yet!”

Abby shot Holtz a look that clearly asked for help, asked for the blonde to step in, but Holtzmann shook her head, grinning and giving Abby a look that said ‘You brought this on yourself. You’re on your own with this.’

“You were supposed to be my  _ best friend _ , Abby! You were the  _ only _ person who believed me, once, and still you  _ left _ me. You left me when I needed you most. I jumped into a  _ portal _ to save you, I risked my life and my reputation and everything else I cared about for  _ you _ , and  _ still _ you thought I was going to leave again?! Did that mean  _ nothing _ to you?! You of all people should have  _ known _ how difficult that was for me, you should have  _ seen _ what was going on. You should have  _ helped _ me, instead of judging me and shutting me out!”

“Erin, baby”, Patty tried to calm her down next, but Erin wouldn’t have any of it, glaring at her now, crossing her arms over her chest, not shouting anymore as she shot back her answer, but still sounding highly angered.

“Don’t ‘ _Erin, baby_ ’ me!”, she snapped, Patty recoiling at her glare, “you know I’m right! If you had listened to Holtz when she came to you about this whole mess for the first time, it would have ended much sooner! And you know I was in no state to ask for help on my own, not with how _he_ was manipulating me! Do you have any idea what it’s like? To look at your friends and think that they only put up with you until they found someone better? To think that you’re completely _worthless,_ that no one cares about you?”

At this, some of Holtzmann’s glee vanished as her heart clenched up. Abby looked as if she was close to tears now, and Patty was swallowing heavily as well, but Erin wasn’t done yet, her fists and voice trembling now as she went on.

“Every single day I’d come here, hoping to find a place where I could feel safe. Or loved. Or just something that could make me  _ forget _ about the things going on at home. And every single day I’d be met with judgement, and anger, and isolation.  _ Every. Single. Day _ . If your goal was to make me feel like I was back in fucking high school, mission accomplished! It made it  _ so much easier _ for him to tell me you didn’t care about me, because  _ nothing _ you did made me believe otherwise!”

Both Abby and Patty seemed to understand the severity of the situation now, neither of them daring to argue with Erin as she ranted.

“And I know, I  _ know _ most of this is apparently ‘irrational’, but it’s not going away, either, is it? I’m still convinced you’ll kick me out! I’m still convinced I’m on borrowed time here. I still believe it’s only a matter of time before you’ll all leave me again, before you’ll leave me alone. And you could have  _ stopped _ this, you could have  _ helped _ me, and you  _ didn’t _ ! And now look at me!”

Some of the anger was vanishing from her voice now, as the tremble increased, “I can’t even tell Holtz how I feel without stuttering and stammering like an idiot! And she  _ loves _ me! She loves me, and I  _ know _ she loves me, but I’m still so terrified! Half the time I’m afraid she’ll hurt me, and half the time I’m afraid she’s going to leave me. Do you have any idea what it’s like, to be afraid of the person you love?!”

“I’d never hurt you, Erin”, Holtzmann threw in, the only one who could presently dare to do so without being in danger of getting yelled at. The physicist’s gaze softened noticeably when she looked at the blonde, her tone much kinder as well when she replied.

“I know, Holtz, I know”, she reassured the younger woman, making her smile slightly, “the rational part of me knows. But he messed me up so much, I  _ know  _ he did, and still there’s part of me which is so scared that one day I’ll make you angry and you’ll hurt me like he did… And I know that’s his fault, I know, but I can’t stop. No matter how much I want to, I can’t stop thinking that way. And I thought therapy would help, I wanted so badly for it to help with that, but it doesn’t!”

She had gotten louder again as she’d gone on, and even though she still looked tense and upset, and Holtzmann feared she might make things worse than better, she hurriedly got up from her seat and moved to where the physicist was standing, wrapping her up in an embrace. After a few tense moments, Erin allowed herself to relax into the hug, a shaky breath escaping her as she returned it.

“I just want to get better.” Erin almost whimpered, Holtzmann’s heart clenching up again, missing the guilty looks Abby and Patty exchanged as she buried her face in the engineer’s shoulder, “I don’t want to feel like this anymore, I just want to get better… But it’s not working…”

“But it is”, Holtzmann told her, rubbing her back and smiling at her when she looked up at her, features full of doubt, “You’re getting better. Even if you don’t notice it yet, you are.”

Erin gave her a doubtful look, but didn’t try to contradict her. Abby cleared her throat and made the physicist look at her, her anger fading away further when she saw the tears in her friend’s eyes.

“We know that apologizing won’t fix any of this”, Abby said, Patty nodding at once, “but we’re truly sorry Erin. I’m so sorry, if we hadn’t been so blind… I’m sorry…”

“Everything you just said was true”, Patty added, with a pained look at the redhead, “and we deserved all that, and more. We’re truly sorry, Erin.”

Not quite ready yet to forgive them, Erin just nodded weakly, while Holtzmann kept rubbing her back. Her gaze dropped to the floor as she let the engineer know in a soft voice that she’d like to go upstairs now, Holtzmann nodding at once, giving Abby and Patty a pointed look as she told them Erin and she would see them tomorrow.

“Have a good evening”, she added, with another pointed look. After another moment, Abby and Patty nodded, both of them looking ashamed and sad when they left, but Erin couldn’t find it within herself to feel sorry for them, even felt marginally better after how she had yelled at them.

_ Perhaps,  _ she thought to herself,  _ they hadn’t deserved that… but I didn’t deserve what Phil did to me, either. _

It was the first time that she had a thought like this one, so far always having believed that what had happened to her had been something she had deserved, for one reason or another. And as she realized this, she even managed a weak smile as she walked upstairs with Holtzmann, all at once believing the engineer about slowly getting better, and wondering if maybe, yelling at her friends like this even had helped with this.


	47. Chapter 47

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter has mentions of emotional and physical abuse, along with dubious consent. Just a lil heads-up for you guys.

Once they had made it to their shared bedroom - technically, it still was Holtzmann’s alone, but she had been sharing it with Erin for so long that she couldn’t think of it as just hers anymore - Holtzmann briefly excused herself to the bathroom. When she came back, drying her hands on her shirt, she found Erin sitting on the bed, the way her fingers were fidgeting and how she was looking at everything but at Holtzmann telling the engineer at once that she was nervous about something.

“I want to tell you”, the physicist blurted, before Holtzmann had the chance to ask what was upsetting her, “um… about him. If you… if you want to hear it, of course. I mean, I don’t want to make you listen to this if you have something else to do or… I don’t know…”

“I’ll listen to anything you want to tell me.” the engineer reassured her at once, moving to sit next to her and, after a brief look to make sure it was okay, putting one arm around her shoulders. “And anything you  _ can  _ tell me. If it hurts too much and you want to stop, it’s okay, too.”

“No.” Erin shook her head, swallowing heavily. “I want to tell you. I think… You deserve to know.”

She had spoken of some of the things Phil had done to her during therapy, of course, but somehow, this was different. And even though part of her knew that it was irrational and wrong, another, louder part of her feared that Holtzmann might judge her for the things she was about to hear. That Holtzmann was going to tell her that she was too pathetic for having allowed Phil to do all these things to her, and that she didn’t want to be with such a helpless, pathetic mess of a person.

_ You know she won’t say this,  _ she then told herself, taking in a deep breath as she steeled herself for what she wanted to tell the blonde,  _ you know she won’t. Tell her, she deserves to know. _

“Can we…” She began slowly, Holtzmann picking up on it immediately as she grabbed the blanket and allowed Erin to snuggle up next to her, knowing the physicist probably needed the closeness.

“...I think he knew what he was doing...” Erin mumbled after taking in a few more deep breaths, feeling a tiny bit better when Holtzmann rubbed her back reassuringly, “He knew better than to… start with the big stuff right away.”

She fell silent for a while, sorting through her thoughts. Sensing that this was what Erin was doing, Holtzmann kept rubbing her back, her heart clenching at the tremble in the physicist’s voice when she did speak on.

“He knew better than that, so he started small.” She let Holtzmann know, unable to look at her though, staring at her hands instead, fingers still fidgeting nervously, “Maybe he’s just always been this way, things he actually  _ believes _ are true… Even back when we first dated, he’d do this. Seemingly harmless comments about what I ate, my clothes… He’d always tell me he just said these things because he cared, and because I didn’t know better, I believed him.”

She swallowed heavily, once more realizing that, during all the time she had been with Holtzmann - even all the time she had actually  _ known _ her as a friend - the engineer had not once said something like that to her, and certainly not under the guise that she cared. Instead, Holtzmann was showing her how much she cared every day, through both her actions and words.

Erin forced to fight back tears as she fully realized how much Phil actually had manipulated her with his words and behaviour.

“Thinking back,” she went on once she could be more or less sure she wouldn’t burst into tears the moment she’d open her mouth again, “he knew exactly what he was doing, how to… pace it. He’d get more snide, more cutting, but I think I was getting used to it and not thinking much of it. I kept believing him when he said he was just telling me these things because he cared. No one ever really did that, you know? Tell me they cared… So I believed him. And by the time he got… really mean, I think it was too late to realize what was going on…”

She thought back to a particular painful incident, and from how she tensed up, Holtzmann could easily tell that some unpleasant memory was plaguing her. Rubbing the redhead’s back again, she gave her an encouraging look, and after a moment, Erin went on, unaware of Holtzmann’s free hand clenching into an angry fist as the physicist’s words made the engineer angry at Phil all over again.

“If he hadn’t done it as carefully as he did”, Erin let her know, still staring at her hands, which she by now had clasped tightly in her lap, “I might have realized that something was off when I came home slimed to him for the first time. He… he told me how disgusting it is, and he sort of… pushed me? To the bathroom. But he was all nice and sweet again when I came back out of the shower, so I believed it wasn’t about me as a person, just the slime, and that it was a one time thing… God, I’ve been so stupid.”

“No”, Holtzmann gave back at once, shaking her head for emphasis, “You’ve not been stupid, cupcake… This isn’t your fault. Like you said, he knew what he was doing, he knew how to… I don’t know, test out how far he can go and then escalate it further. People like him, they know exactly how to do what they do, and it’s not your fault, even if he made you think it was.”

“He was good at that,” Erin replied tonelessly, prompting Holtzmann to move her free hand to grasp hers. “at making me feel like everything was my fault. When he.. hit me for the first time, he… he did that too.”

She took in a shaky breath, once more close to tears. Worried, Holtzmann told her that she didn’t need to say anything else if it hurt too much, but Erin shook her head, looking her in the eye for the first time since she had started speaking as she replied.

“I want to tell you.” she said. “I…  _ need _ to tell you, I think.” Holtzmann nodded, understanding where Erin was coming form and simply pulling her girlfriend closer, Erin swallowing heavily before she went on. “He… he took a while, you know. Before he actually hit me for the first time. He… he’d push me, sometimes, but… We went to a faculty party and he had too much wine and when we got home, he was all angry at me, telling me I’d been talking too much about myself.”

She smiled a slightly bitter smile at the memory, seeing it so much clearer now than she had back then. Encouragingly, Holtzmann squeezed her hand, and after a moment, Erin continued, looking at her hands again though, finding it hard to look the engineer in the eye once more.

“I’d still talk back to him, sometimes, at this point.” She mumbled, “. I still believed that he wasn’t always right, still thought he’d believe me when I said I didn’t want to hurt him on purpose.. but after that evening, I pretty much stopped. I told him that people had been  _ asking  _ about my work, and I was just telling them what they wanted to know, and when I turned away from him, he punched me in the back. Right above the kidneys. It… it hurt.”

A few tears did fall now, and Erin sniffled a bit, while Holtzmann wanted to strangle Phil with her bare hands yet again, thinking back to the times she had been hit in the kidneys on busts and all too aware that  _ It hurt _ had been a drastic understatement.

“He apologized,” Erin went on, wiping at her eyes, “immediately, while I was still gasping for air and trying not to cry. But… even when he said he was sorry, he made it my fault. He told me that… I made him angry. That I made him act this way. That he was sorry, but if I hadn’t been so selfish this wouldn’t have happened.”

“Of course he did”, Holtzmann mumbled under her breath, but still loud enough for Erin to hear. She shrugged, then wiped at her eyes again, giving the engineer a thankful look when the blonde offered a tissue, taking the time to blow her nose before she went on.

“He’d always do that...” she mumbled, for the first time saying this out loud, not even having brought this up in therapy so far as she hadn’t fully realized the pattern until now. “He’d hit me, apologize, and during his apology, tell me how it was still my fault. Because I _ made _ him do it. By being too aggravating, or talking back too much, or God knows what else he came up with…” She shuddered, Holtzmann placing a soft kiss to the top of her head before Erin continued.

“He’d just blame me for everything… Or tell me I was being too dramatic. Tell me I was overreacting. He’d… He’d often say that he had been nothing but good to me… That he’d been changing things about himself just for me… And like an idiot, I believed him. And because of that, I was scared to tell him when he hurt me… He’d say I was just overreacting, or annoying him more, and I.. I didn’t want to make him angrier. But he knew, I think. He knew, because he’d… When he held me, sometimes, he’d push on those bruises… On those places where he knew he’d hurt me…”

“One time he… he really lost control and he threw me into the dresser… I think I… I don’t know, bruised a rib or something. It really hurt, for days. I couldn’t breathe and I actually went down on my knees. And he told me how he was sorry, but that I made him lose control, and that he hadn’t hit me that hard, anyway. He told me that, if I hadn’t tripped over my own feet and fallen into that dresser, then this wouldn’t have hurt as much. At the time, I believed him. I could actually  _ remember _ myself tripping. But that wasn’t how it happened. He pushed me. He hit me. I just… I didn’t want to accept it.”

Holtzmann took in a shaky breath at hearing this, unable to stop herself from imagining the scene Erin just had described, like a movie in her mind’s eye. Phil grabbing Erin - who was a good head shorter than him, and much more fragile - and actually  _ throwing  _ her into the dresser, hard enough to hurt her like this.

“It was easier to believe that it’s my fault.” Erin went on, unaware of the dark images in Holtzmann’s mind, “You know I’ve always… had issues with my self-esteem. Even before all this. It’s why the whole ‘fraud’ thing annoyed me so much. I understand Abby wanted to keep working, that she thought that was more important. but with my parents… It had never been that easy for me. I’m not…  _ like _ her... and he must have known that, too, and… I don’t know, made use of that. So I’d accept it was my fault, and I told myself I’d just have to do better so he wouldn’t get angry at me anymore.”

“He knew.” Holtzmann mumbled, a bit startled at how hoarse her own voice sounded, “Like you said, he knew what he was doing. And he was gaslighting you, so you’d believe it’s your own fault.”

Erin nodded, swallowing heavily as the full truth of this hit home - she knew what gaslighting was, had heard of it before, and had asked herself why anyone would do this to another person, but it never had occurred to her that this was exactly what Phil had been doing to her. How he had kept her in line and had slowly, but steadily chipped away at her self-esteem and had made her believe that he was the only one who truly cared for her.

“He’d always tell me this”, she said out loud, prompting Holtzmann to squeeze her hand, “that he only did this and that because he was looking out for me. He never said  _ I’m not letting you do this, Erin _ , but… I’d end up not doing it anyway, because of the comments he’d make. That’s why I stopped going on busts, you know, because he told me he didn’t want me to get hurt. He told me he worried, that he missed me, and I felt so guilty about it…” She shook her head, slowly. “One time he even said that he doesn’t like it if he doesn’t know where I am, who is calling us for these busts, because how could he be sure I’m not cheating on him with our clients?”

“What?!” Holtzmann couldn’t hold back a startled exclamation, “he said that?”

“Among other things”, Erin mumbled, thinking back to the event they had visited and his comments about the dress, “then I’d… I’d tell him that I would never do this, that I loved him and he… he’d say  _ I know _ or  _ Well good, Erin, and you know how I feel about you _ . He never just told me that he loves me, too, the way… the way you do. He probably didn’t. Instead he told me how I should know that no one but him could ever care for me anyway and I believed him.”

She fell silent, having one more thing she wanted to tell Holtzmann, but not quite sure how to say it. For a moment, she considered just keeping it to herself, all too aware that the engineer might end up rushing off to perhaps blow up Phil’s car - or apartment - once she knew, but then telling herself that Holtzmann deserved to know, after everything she had done for her.

“Sometimes”, she thus started, then had to interrupt herself and swallowed heavily, her gaze focusing on her hands again as she tried again after a few deep breaths, “um… You asked me once if he ever… You know. Against my will.”

Holtzmann felt her blood run cold and her heart actually  _ stop _ , and she wondered if this was what a panic attack felt like Clearly, Erin could see all of this on her face, her eyes going wide before she quickly shook her head.

“No, no”, she hurriedly reassured the engineer, making it her turn to squeeze the younger woman’s hand, “Not… he didn’t. Not like that, you know, with force or something. But… He’d get angry if I didn’t… feel like it, so… sometimes I went along with it even if I wasn’t in the mood. It wasn’t that bad, you know, it was always about him anyway and he… usually he got done fast.”

Holtzmann took in a deep breath in response, then ran a shaky hand through her hair - perhaps, she sourly thought to herself, Phil hadn’t physically held Erin down and had forced himself upon her, but what had happened was just as bad, and she knew that sooner or later, it would have gotten even worse, had they not managed to get Erin away from the man.

“I’m sorry…” Erin spoke quietly, Holtzmann immediately shaking her head as she pulled Erin even closer to ker, kissing the top of her head again.

“If I didn’t need to worry about going to jail, I’d blow up his car”, Holtzmann grumbled, earning a weak smile from the physicist while she shook her head, squeezing her hand once more.

“Don’t you dare.” Erin replied, making the engineer look at her, “He’s not worth it. And… I’m away from him, because you got me out, he can’t do any more harm.”

“Yeah, he can’t, but I’d still kick his ass from here to next Sunday if I got the chance.” the engineer grumbled, and Erin smiled again, her response making the blonde look at her in surprise, then delight.

“I know”, Erin told her, smiling while her thumb ran over the younger woman’s knuckles, “I know you would, and that’s one of the reasons why I love you.”

Only when she had finished speaking, Erin realized what she just had said, and the ease with which she had said it; and from how Holtzmann was grinning at her, the engineer had taken note of this as well.

“I love you…” Erin spoke quietly, looking a little amazed at how easily those words seemed to fall from her lips again, a smile breaking out on her face as she looked back at Holtzmann, who was positively beaming at her. “I love you.  she repeated again, a little stronger this time, the hint of a giggle in her voice.

“I love you too, cupcake”, Holtzmann told her, once more showing her how drastically different to Phil she was. And in response, Erin pulled her close for a kiss, letting out a small giggle as she pulled back again, positively giddy at this recent development. Determined to make up for all the times Erin had been unable to say it, she kissed Holtzmann again, and again, telling her she loved her over and over until they both fell asleep, tangled in each others embrace.

And as Erin drifted off, she knew that it had been right to tell Holtzmann all of this, feeling oddly relieved and relaxed now, and suddenly convinced that things would only get better from now on.


	48. Chapter 48

The next morning, Erin was the first to wake up. Momentarily, she wasn’t sure when Holtzmann and she had fallen asleep the previous evening. While it had made her feel better to tell Holtzmann all the things Phil had done to her, it had been exhausting as well.

Even though sleeping in her day clothes probably hadn’t been the most comfortable thing she could have done, Erin felt refreshed and relaxed. She had woken up with her head resting on Holtzmann’s shoulder, one of the engineer’s arms loosely draped over her waist, the other dangling off the bed, prompting Erin to grimace as she was quite certain that it had fallen asleep in that position.

After spending the night in clothes she’d had on all during the previous day too, Erin felt a bit icky, but not so much that she wanted to get up immediately. Instead, she snuggled closer to Holtzmann, the engineer letting out an adorable grunt. She didn’t wake up, though, giving the physicist the chance to rest in her embrace for a bit longer, a small smile curling Erin’s lips as she listened to the younger woman’s slow, steady heartbeat.

As she lay there, her mind wandered, and she found herself pondering when she had felt this good and content the last time. She had felt pretty good during the night Holtzmann and she had made love for the first time, but not even then she had felt so content and oddly free. It was as if finally speaking about the things Phil had done had somehow made them easier to bear, in a way.

Holtzmann let out a weird mixture of grunt and snore beneath her, and stirred, signalling that she was waking up. A few moments later, her eyes opened, meeting Erin’s, and the physicist’s heart swelled when the engineer immediately gave her a bright smile.

“Good morning, hot stuff.” the blonde said after an enormous yawn, “Slept well?”

“Yes,” Erin told her with a small smile of her own, “even though we fell asleep fully dressed. Did you?”

“I always sleep well when you’re next to me.” Holtzmann let her know, her smile widening a bit. She leaned in for a brief, but tender kiss, then sat up and stretched, prompting Holtzmann to sit up as well, another yawn coming from the engineer as she ran both hands through her hair.

“Yikes.” she said, after having encountered numerous tangles in said hair. “This is what I get for falling asleep with my hair all in it’s ‘do. That’s gonna be a bitch to brush now.”

“Aw...” Erin let out, sounding sympathetic. “I’m…” She trailed off as she realized what she almost had said - she nearly had apologized for this, for something she hadn’t directly caused.  _ After all,  _ she thought to herself,  _ they had fallen asleep more or less by accident, and neither she nor Holtzmann were to blame. _

“Jesus...” she mumbled, earning a confused and somewhat concerned look from Holtzmann, Erin clarifying what was bothering her before the engineer had a chance to ask.“Do you think I’ll ever manage to stop apologizing for things which aren’t my fault?”

“Yes.” Holtzmann replied decisively at once, moving to rub her back, the way she was immediately ready and willing to comfort and support her, even after literally just having woken up, making Erin’s heart clench up. “It might take a while, but you will. And you know we’ll help you with getting there, every step of the way.”

“You might.” Erin said with a small sigh, grimacing as she thought back to the previous day, “Abby and Patty maybe not so much, after how I yelled at them…”

“Nah, they had that coming and they know it.” Holtzmann reassured her, still rubbing her back. “They’re not gonna be mad at you about that.”

“Hope you’re right...” Erin mumbled with a small sigh. Then, she cleared her throat and forced the worries out of her mind, knowing she couldn’t do anything but wait for the two women in question to arrive at the firehouse, managing a small smile again when she asked Holtzmann if she wanted to have a shower.

“Together?” Holtzmann gave back, with a cheeky grin which made Erin blush a bit. She nodded, though, and laughed when the engineer let out a “woohoo!”, then practically jumped up from the bed and grasped her hand. The physicist was still giggling as they headed to the bathroom together, feeling better than she had in months, astonished at the difference telling Holtzmann all about Phil had made for her mental state.

* * *

By the time Abby and Patty arrived at the firehouse, Erin felt nervous and apprehensive again. Part of her - the small, but vicious part which still sounded like Phil, despite the progress she had made in therapy - was sure that what had happened that previous day had been too much, and that she’d ended up kicked out of the team once more. She tried to ignore this voice best she could, trying to remind herself of what Holtzmann had said to reassure her, but it wouldn’t shut up, and she gulped when Abby’s eyes met hers.

For a moment, she was so sure that Abby would be angry and upset with her that she actually  _ saw _ these emotions in the other woman’s eyes, and her blood ran cold. However, when she took a second, closer look, she was relieved to see that Abby wasn’t angry, but was instead giving her a kind, albeit somewhat worried, look.

“Good morning.” Erin said, giving her best to sound even and friendly, not wanting Abby to think that she’d have another Hulk-out any moment (and how proud would Holtzmann be, the physicist thought to herself, once she’d tell her that  _ Hulk-out  _ was how she had just mentally described what had happened the previous day), “Um… we made coffee. But there are no donuts.”

“We brought some.” Patty was the one to answer that, holding the cardboard box up for emphasis, the smile she gave Erin making the redhead feel even better about the whole situation, and giving her the courage she needed to speak up again.

“Um, about yesterday…” she started, but before she could say more than that, Abby shook her head, and Erin’s heart plummeted to her stomach, dread overtaking her again. Luckily, it seemed Holtzmann had been right, Abby’s words making the physicist calmer at once; she even managed a slight smile in response.

“Don’t even  _ think  _ about apologizing.” Abby told her, her tone and the slight smile on her face making the words sound less harsh than they could have. “You were right with everything you said, and you had… still have… every right to be angry. About what happened, and… at Patty and me, for not seeing what was right in front of our eyes the whole time.”

“We’re the ones who have to apologize.” Patty added, “Even though it won’t fix anything. Jeez, Erin, I’ve asked myself a thousand times why I didn’t see what was happening, if I hadn’t dismissed Holtzy so quickly back then… And how often I told you I’m so happy for you, Jesus, you have every right to be pissed at us.”

Erin’s first impulse was still to apologize, but she bit it back, just like she had with Holtzmann in the morning. Instead of saying that she was sorry, she let out a small sigh, then gave the two women a wry smile, feeling even better about the situation when Holtzmann put a tender hand on her back in a quiet gesture of comfort and support.

“I can’t even tell you how sorry I am.” Abby said, sounding as if she was close to tears, “I completely failed you as a friend. I should have seen what was happening, what he was doing to you, and instead I… God, this could have gone so wrong when I kicked you out. If you hadn’t come back with him…”

Erin certainly did not want to go there. She wasn’t quite sure how her life would have gone, had the Ghostbusters not gotten her out the day after the big fight, but she was certain that it wouldn’t have ended well for her. And so, she just gave a brief, helpless shrug, nodding though when Abby asked if it was okay to hug her.

“He knew what he was doing.” She mumbled as Abby embraced her and she returned the hug, only for her throat to tighten up and her heart to clench. She realized at once that she wouldn’t be able to tell Abby and Patty much more than that. She had told Holtzmann, had told her  _ all  _ of it, but this was something entirely different, and Erin found herself unable to keep a tremble out of her voice as she continued.

“He knew what he was doing so it was hard to notice.” She added, “but… I’m sorry, but I can’t tell you more than this. Not… not right now.”

She had apologized again, she realized belatedly, and it only made her feel worse. Thankfully though, Abby kept holding on to her, and even though the researcher was still crying, she managed a weak smile, nodding while she rubbed Erin’s back now.

“I’ll tell you at some point.” Erin added, blinking back tears of her own, even though hers mostly came from the relief that Abby and Patty didn’t hate her, not even after the previous evening’s yell fest, “I promise. Just… I’ll need some time.”

“Take all the time you need, babygirl.” Patty told her, moving to join the hug, “and… I’m really sorry too. I know this won’t magically fix things, but I am.”

Erin managed a weak smile, then gave Holtzmann a brief, somewhat pleading look. The engineer caught on at once and moved closer to embrace all three of them, short arms or not. And as they stood there huddled in a group hug, for the first time in months, Erin dared to believe that perhaps, the friendship with both Abby and Patty could go back to how it had been after all. It was going to take some time, certainly, but the promise of forgiveness hung in the air. And just like that, Erin honestly believed they - The Ghostbusters - would be okay.


	49. Chapter 49

After what Holtzmann had dubbed “Erin’s Epic Yell Fest” - a name which always made Erin blush and clear her throat whenever it was brought up - and the talk which had followed it the morning after, all four Ghostbusters were happy to realize that the rift the whole situation had caused between Erin and Abby and Patty was indeed slowly closing again. Erin was still weary at times, part of her still convinced that sooner or later, they’d turn on her and kick her out, but they were nothing but supportive and gave their best to help. With the added help of Diana, and Holtzmann’s constant and unwavering support, Erin slowly found herself able to believe that perhaps, things could go back to how they had been  _ before _ soon.

Days went by and turned into weeks. Erin kept going to her therapy appointments, worked in the lab with Holtzmann and on her equations, and she joined the team on every bust that came across their desks. Of course she got slimed during each and every one of them, but Holtzmann always made a point of reassuring her that she was still her beautiful cupcake even when covered in the greenish goo, and kissed her every single time, making sure that no panic attack would constrict her breath and make her heart rate spike.

They were back to a sort of routine, and so Erin didn’t pay much attention to time going by. She certainly didn’t pay attention to any upcoming special dates - though even if she had noticed which day was coming up, she wouldn’t have thought about it much, not really having celebrated this certain day many times before in her life.

She only realized that something was up when Holtzmann suddenly started acting strangely all day long; more so than usual, that is. The blonde seemed distracted, as if her mind was occupied by something. Erin was quite used at this point to the engineer sometimes mentally going off to her work, but this was a new level she hadn’t witnessed so far. And despite her progress with therapy, she immediately began to worry, began to analyze the last few days, trying to figure out if she had done something wrong and had pissed Holtzmann off.

It took her a while to find enough courage to speak up about her worries, but she knew that she had to if she didn’t want this to eat her up. As a result, she approached Holtzmann in the late afternoon. Abby and Patty had already headed home, which gave them some privacy - even though Erin hoped she wouldn’t end up needing said privacy to cry her eyes out because the talk would end with Holtzmann telling her she wanted to break up.

_ Don’t be stupid,  _ she told herself as she stopped opposite of the blonde, her gaze focused on the engineer’s face, not one glance spared at what the blonde was working on,  _ she won’t break up with you. She loves you. _

“Holtz…?” she started after she nervously had cleared her throat, Holtzmann actually jumping before she looked up with wide eyes. (If Erin hadn’t been so worried that she had done something wrong, she might have recognized that look as  _ Shit, I got caught _ ), “um… is everything… okay?”

“Yes, sure, just peachy.” Holtzmann babbled, the words coming out fast and a bit stilted, making Erin frown as the tone immediately made her think back to the toast Holtzmann had made shortly after Times Square, “Everything’s perfect hot stuff. Hey, can you do me a favour and close your eyes for a minute?”

“...sure?” Erin replied, not sure what to think of this. She did as Holtzmann had asked though, and heard her do… something quite frantically, holding back the urge to frown to herself as she tried to figure out what the engineer was doing.

“Okay!” Holtzmann said after a while - which had felt decidedly longer than one minute, but perhaps it only had felt this way because she’d just been standing there with her eyes closed, “You can look now.”

Curious, Erin opened her eyes, and a moment later, they went wide as her breath got caught in her throat. She nearly wanted to smack herself for immediately having assumed the worst, now that it was clear  _ why  _ Holtzmann had been distracted.

Holtzmann was holding a - somewhat unevenly cut out - red paper heart. There was glitter, a  _ lot  _ of glitter, and more smaller hearts glued to the big one she was holding, the words “Be my Valentine?” written on it with black marker, and all Erin could do was stare, swallowing heavily as she felt herself tear up.

“For you”, Holtzmann said, holding the heart out to her. When she took it, Erin realized it could be opened like a book, and she fought to hold back her tears as she did so, even though this became distinctly harder when she saw what Holtzmann had written on the inside, more little hearts and glitter all around the words.

_ Your body must be made of oxygen and neon because you are the ONe. _

“That is the nerdiest and cutest thing anyone has ever said to me.” she brought out, looking up from the card so her eyes met Holtzmann’s, “And of course I’ll be your valentine, Holtz. I’m so happy right now…”

“Excellent!” Holtzmann beamed, practically vaulting over the workbench between them so she could hug the physicist, making her giggle with her enthusiasm. “And perfect, because I sort of went ahead and made reservations for Friday. I thought we could have dinner, and maybe go dancing if you like. If not, it’s okay, too, and just have a good V-Day because why not be clichéd for once?”

“Yes, why not?” Erin agreed with another giggle, then pulled the blonde even closer for a tender kiss. When they pulled apart again, she continued, barely above a whisper now, so relieved that the words she still struggled with at times came with ease. “Thank you for this. For everything. I… I love you.”

Even though saying these three words had become easier for Erin, Holtzmann was all too aware of how she still struggled with them at times. And so, the ease with which she had said them this time made her beam brightly, Erin smiling back at her almost just as wide, unable to stop even when they kissed again.

“And I love you, hot stuff.” the engineer said after the kiss, with another happy smile, “And now I can’t wait for Friday. Erin’s gonna be my valentine! Woohoo!”

She pumped her fist, and Erin laughed again, touched by her enthusiasm. When they kissed once more, she was simply happy and content, looking forward to Friday as well, curious to see where Holtzmann had made reservations and what the evening would bring.

* * *

Erin hadn’t seen Holtzmann in formal wear since the dreadful formal event to which she had gone with Phil -  _ to which Phil was your plus one,  _ she corrected herself, not even aware that this was yet another sign of her progress - and she actually had forgotten how good the engineer looked in it. As a result, she found herself quite stunned and even breathless when she came down the stairs after getting ready. Erin was wearing the dress Holtzmann liked, with her hair falling down onto her shoulders and back and some light make-up, but it was Holtzmann’s outfit that had her speechless once she got a good look at the outfit the engineer had chosen for the evening.

It was a suit Erin hadn’t seen before, charcoal grey with a matching vest and a white button-up shirt. A dark red tie and perfectly polished black shoes completed the picture, only the yellow-tinted steel frame glasses and the engineer’s usual hair-do remaining of her day to day attire. Even her hair was done with more care than usual, Erin could tell, not a single lock out of place.

“Wow”, Holtzmann said before Erin had the chance to speak up, looking at her as if she was a wonderful and precious and unique dream come true. “You look amazing, Erin. I mean… wow.”

“So do you”, Erin returned the compliment, smiling when Holtzmann beamed at her. They shared a brief, but tender kiss, then Holtzmann offered her arm with a flourish, earning a giggle from the physicist as she took hold of it, hooking her hand into the crook of the engineer’s arm.

“Your carriage awaits, my lady.” Holtzmann told her as they made their way to the door, “Or, better said, one of New York’s yellow cabs awaits. I hope you’ll like the place I chose for dinner…”

“I’m sure I will”, Erin smiled, earning another happy smile. The cab was indeed waiting, and gave Erin reason to wonder if Holtzmann had pulled strings again to make this happen, figuring that all cabs would be quite busy on Valentine’s Day. The driver just smiled at them when Holtzmann held the door open for her, letting her get in first, every inch the perfect gentleman.

Apparently, the driver knew where to go, since Holtzmann didn’t have to give the woman an address. She just started to drive, Erin feeling curious, but not anxious, knowing that Holtzmann only had her happiness in mind for that evening.

The drive didn’t take long, the cab stopping in front of a small, but cozy-looking restaurant. A closer look revealed that it was Italian, and once Holtzmann had paid the driver and they had gotten out of the cab, the engineer took tender hold of Erin’s hand, smiling when she explained why she had chosen this place.

“This is where I got our food for our first date.” She let Erin know, making her smile as well as she thought back to said date, “So, I dunno... I figured it’d be nice to have dinner here tonight.”

Erin nodded her agreement, then the couple entered the restaurant. The inside was as cozy as the outside had implied, and the beaming waitress led them to one of the booths, a card with “Reserved for Holtzmann and the ONe” on the table, rose petals strewn around it, the callback to the card the engineer had made for her and the general romanticness of the gesture nearly making Erin tear up again.

“I don’t even care how the food will be.” She told Holtzmann as she sat down, keeping her voice low though so the restaurant staff wouldn’t hear, “This is already the best Valentine’s day I’ve ever had. Thank you so much, Holtz.”

“My pleasure, hot stuff”, Holtzmann reassured her, reaching over the table to grasp her hands. They beamed at each other, Erin feeling so good and happy that it seemed almost absurd to her as she wondered what she had done to deserve someone like Holtzmann in her life. She decided not to question it, and to just enjoy it, already knowing that this was going to be one of the best evenings in her life.

* * *

As it had turned out, Erin had been right, and the evening  _ had  _ been one of the best in her life. After an amazing dinner, Holtzmann and she had gone dancing, like the engineer had suggested, having spent quite a while on the dancefloor among other couples, slow-dancing to a playlist which apparently had consisted solely of romantic love songs. When they had gotten back to the firehouse, Holtzmann had given her very best to make Erin scream in pleasure again, something she had accomplished several times before Erin had insisted that now, it was her turn.

After that perfect Friday evening, Saturday and Sunday were quite relaxing for the couple as well. As a result, Erin felt content and simply  _ good _ on Monday morning, and not even the fact that they had a meeting at the mayor’s office first thing could change that.

Unlike Holtzmann and her, Abby was quite grumbly about said meeting, not a big fan of them in general and certainly not on Monday morning. Patty was fairly neutral, and while Erin got a bit nervous when they walked into the office and found Jennifer Lynch waiting for them with a bunch of files in her hands, she still felt good, aided considerably by having Holtzmann by her side.

“Welcome.” the PA said once they all had sat down, Erin taking note of how she briefly glanced at Holtzmann’s hand holding hers. No emotion showing through Jennifer’s features though, leaving Erin guessing what she thought of this development. Did she approve? Disapprove? She knew Holtzmann and Jennifer had grown a little closer over the past months, the blonde considering the PA somewhat of a friend now, but Erin was still a little wary of Jennifer Lynch, what with her continuous insistence they had to be painted as frauds at times. “Sadly, the mayor couldn’t make it today, but I hope you’ll be happy speaking to me, instead.”

“Yeah, sure.” Abby was the one to answer, “But don’t mind me asking, why are we here? Everything has been going smooth lately, no?”

“Yes.”, Jennifer replied at once, making Erin feel a bit less antsy. “More so than before, even. I’m happy to say that the quality of your paperwork has increased again. Makes my job a lot easier.”

They all knew whom they had to thank for the improved quality of the paperwork, and Abby smiled at Erin while Holtzmann squeezed the physicist’s hand, grinning. Erin blushed a bit, but smiled back, only for her smile to fade at what Jennifer said next.

“This meeting is just routine. And apart from telling you this", she let the Ghostbusters know, “I do have to remind you to please be discreet about your work. While positive articles are a good thing in case it ever does happen to become public that you’re receiving government funding, we’d still prefer as little media echo about your work as possible.”

And just like that, Erin’s good mood was gone, and for the first time since the yell fest, she felt angry, her temper flaring, the words leaving her mouth before she could think about them and perhap attempt to stop herself.

“What are you trying to say?” She demanded to know, earning looks of surprise from the other three. She had been going to the meetings with them for a while now, but she had always remained mostly quiet, and not even Holtzmann had expected her to speak up like this, “You’re not going back to the cat and its damn bag, right? Because we all know that the cat ran far, far away from the bag by now, and…”

She would have gone on, had she not noticed the way the corners of Jennifer’s mouth twitched slightly upwards. Momentarily confused, Erin trailed off, then realized what was going on, and Holtzmann nearly squeed at how adorable she looked when she pouted.

“You did that on purpose.” Erin accused the PA, who couldn’t hold back a smirk anymore. “You baited me into this.”

“Yes.” Jennifer confirmed, her smirk turning into a grin, the other three smiling as well, “Indeed, I did. Welcome back, Dr. Gilbert.”

Not quite sure what to say, Erin just smiled a bit sheepishly while Holtzmann squeezed her hand, beaming at her. Jennifer gave her another smile, then got back to business. They still had some routine business to get through, but Erin had to admit that maybe Jennifer wasn’t so bad after all, especially as the PA didn’t mention discretion and the media again. And as Erin sat there, and listened, and added her thoughts and opinions to what the other three had to say, she once again felt  _ good _ .

_ Yes,  _ she thought, squeezing Holtzmann’s hand and even shooting Jennifer a grateful smile as they left, things were going to be okay.

_ I’m going to be okay. _


	50. Chapter 50

_ It was a nice New York summer day,  _ Erin thought to herself as she got out of the car and straightened her skirt. It wasn’t so warm yet that she’d be all sweaty, but still warm enough to let her ditch her jacket and leave it in the Ecto-1. Holtzmann was getting out of the vehicle as well, letting her know that she’d wait for her in the nearby café, and after a brief kiss and a nod, Erin headed into the building for her therapy session.

At this point, there was no need anymore to have these meetings twice a week. The frequence had since been lowered to once a week, and by now to every other week, and there was a bit of a spring in her step when she entered Diana’s office. Erin felt rather good about herself, the week having been successful so far, with a few busts the team had handled well together and an article she had written having been published in a prestigious journal.

“Erin, hello”, Diana greeted her with a bright smile, the physicist smiling back at her as she took her usual seat, “how are you today?”

“Quite fine, thank you.” Erin told her. “Things have been going well since our last meeting. We had a few busts - and I did not get slimed once, which is close to a miracle, actually - and that article I mentioned at our last talk has been published on Monday.”

“Happy to hear that.” Diana let her know, still smiling, “I think I said this before, but let me tell you again, Erin, you’ve made so much progress since you began seeing me, it’s astounding. If I compare the woman I’m talking to right now to the person I met for our first talk… Amazing.”

“Um, thank you.” Erin gave back, not sure if that was the right response, but figuring it was better than saying nothing, “I… I have to say, I do feel more like… I was before this whole mess happened.”

And that was nothing but the truth, she thought to herself. She wasn’t fully back to normal yet, and she knew this, was all too aware of the treacherous little voice which fed her anxieties and often made her overthink things, the voice she listened to way too much on the bad days she still had. But that being said, she  _ was  _ getting better. The nightmares were lessening, her panic attacks were becoming less frequent, and so were the moments when she burst into tears. Things with Abby and Patty were almost back to fully normal, as well, and she was happier with Holtzmann than she ever had thought she would be. And judging by the praise which just had been heaped upon her, Diana could tell all these things too, giving her another smile as she asked her to talk about her days since the last appointment in more detail.

Erin did so, and time went by fairly quickly. An hour later, she left the therapist’s office, feeling good about herself and her life as she walked back to the car, where Holtzmann was already waiting for her.

“Eriiiin”, the engineer half said, half sang the moment Erin was close enough to hear without Holtzmann having to shout, “guess what! Starbucks has their summer specials since  _ today. _ That is fate, a sign, we must get them! Lime refresher, cupcake!”

“Sure,” Erin said with a little laugh, thinking about how she’d never grow tired of Holtzmann’s enthusiasm for all sorts of things, “it’s not like we’re in a hurry to get back.”

She intertwined her fingers with Holtzmann’s as they started walking to the nearest Starbucks, the engineer talking animatedly about the next generation proton shotgun she had been working on for Erin. The physicist listened with a smile on her face, running her thumb over the back of Holtzmann’s hand every now and then, feeling relaxed and content and good… until she spotted a familiar figure up ahead and froze.

It was Phil, it truly was him this time. She had thought she had seen him a few times before, but it never had been him. But this time, it was unmistakable. And he had seen them, too, as he was moving to where Erin had stopped on the sidewalk.

Holtzmann had a second to give her a confused, questioning look, then she took note of the man approaching them. She recognized him instantly, morbidly thinking to herself how she’d never forget that face, not if she’d live another thousand years.

“Erin,” Phil said, giving the physicist an unabashed once-over which made Holtzmann’s skin crawl, “long time no see. You look… fine, I suppose.”

“Fine...” Erin echoed, the only sign for her discomfort being the way her fingers tightened around Holtzmann’s. It was a sign he clearly didn’t pick up on, since he gave her a somewhat smarmy smile. Holtzmann felt like throwing up, a sudden and irrational fear clenching up her heart that he might end up saying just the right - or wrong - things that would make Erin go back to him.

“You looked better when we were still dating.” he said, with another critical look at her. Erin took in a slow, controlled breath, then looked at Holtzmann, her voice carefully controlled when she spoke up.

“Come on, Holtz.” she said, instead of acknowledging what Phil had said in any way, “Let’s just go.”

Eager to get her away from this horrible man, Holtzmann nodded, and they walked past him. She almost expected him to make a grab for Erin - even though that would be ludicrous, in bright daylight on a busy sidewalk - but thankfully, he kept his hands to himself.

He apparently didn’t want to keep his mouth shut, though, speaking up again at once. “I read your article, Erin”, he said, knowing full well how Erin loved to talk about her work. Erin wasn’t sure if she recognized it for the bait it was, but she kept walking regardless, not even reacting to the comment as she forced herself to stare straight ahead, blocking out everything else.

When it became apparent to him Erin refused to react to him in any way, Phil raised his voice, calling after her. “I found it hard to believe that a respected journal would publish such drivel!”

Erin stopped dead in her tracks, pretty much making Holtzmann do the same. Before the engineer could say much of anything, the redhead slowly turned and faced the man, and Holtzmann felt scared all over again when Erin smiled at him.

Only later, she would realize that it had been the sort of smile a wolf would give its prey just before pouncing.

Phil smiled back at her, perfectly unaware that he had just said the wrongest thing he could possibly have said. Erin would have kept on walking had he said more about her weight, or her clothes, or any other aspect of her appearance. She would have thought he wasn’t worth it, that she had made her progress, that she knew her value and his opinion didn’t matter. But now he had insulted her  _ work _ , her  _ intelligence _ , the one thing she’d always been able to pride herself on even in her darkest hours. And all at once, all the pain and terror he had caused her, during the relationship and afterwards, flared up as bright, righteous anger.

She took one swift step closer to him and, in one fluent motion, pulled her fist back, moving too fast to allow him a reaction. Being a Ghostbuster had done wonders for her reflexes and body control, and he never saw it coming, the punch nailing him right in the face, hard enough to send him to the ground with a yelp of both surprise and pain.

As he laid on the sidewalk, whimpering and clutching his bleeding nose, all Holtzmann could do was gape.

Shaking out her fist, Erin turned away from him, finding him pathetic as he laid there now, blood trickling out between his fingers, a stark contrast to the fear he had made her feel during that mess of a time with him. She walked a few steps, fully intending to just leave him on the ground and in her past, then realized that Holtzmann wasn’t by her side.

The engineer was still standing where she had ended up when Erin had stopped a minute ago, staring at her as if she was seeing her for the first time.

“...you coming?” Erin asked after a moment, and that seemed to snap Holtzmann out of her stupor, since she practically ran to her side, her dumbstruck expression turning into one of awe. She took hold of Erin’s shoulders and pulled her close for a resounding smooch, eyes shining when she looked at her afterwards.

“I really,” she then announced, making Erin smile again, “ _ really _ love you right now. That was so badass.”

“I love you, too.” Erin reassured her with a small laugh, words she could say with ease every time now. They kissed once more, ignoring Phil groaning on the sidewalk behind them, then Erin took Holtzmann’s hand again and they continued walking, not even sparing the man another thought as Erin nudged Holtz to continue telling her about her latest weapons upgrade.

And just like that, with Holtzmann’s hand in her own and the sun shining on her face, Erin knew she’d be able to leave another ghost in her past, and that the future would only get better from hereon out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And it is done.  
> What a ride that was :D ForxGood and I want to thank you all for your support and all the love, kudos and comments for this fic <3 Writing it was difficult and challenging at times, but if we were going to tell this story, we wanted to do it right, and we hope we accomplished that. :) Thank you all again for reading! :)


End file.
